Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

120 years, it's been, since The Spine and his siblings were made. Quite the sum of time, by any human’s standards, but still, not that long, in the scheme of things. Humans have lived longer. Five of them have, in fact done that. Which may not be many, and they have not done it by much, but well, The Spine can push off the existential crisis of being one of the oldest things with a memory by oh, seven more years?

Hm.

Hm. That is not a very long time at all.

At least he can rely on turtles for 66 more.

Regardless. Anyway. It is no matter. The Spine is being optimistic right now. In this year of 2016. Things are looking up.

There is, for once, a bright sky on the horizon.

The Spine is not… exactly used to bright skies on the horizon, all things considered. But the sun is out, and things honestly just swell, these days. 

Rabbit’s upgrades and alterations to herself have recently been finished. She’s been happy- although, hm, perhaps happy is an understatement.

His sister has been monumentally herself.

If you had asked him, hm, at any point between 1976 and about 2012, if he had wanted Rabbit to be exponentially more Rabbit, The Spine would have, first, asked you to repeat yourself, then upon confirmation you did mean that, he would have, calmly, thrown his guitar at your head.

She was already plenty Rabbit enough. Thank you.

Or so he thought.

She was not, though. Because she has never been this bright before now. As herself, now that she is finished . 

That is what she calls herself, now. Finished. New wig, outfit, shaping, and face to complete the look. He had been skeptical of the idea, at first, of her getting a new face, when she had first pitched it to them all. Holding Peter Six’s plans out and waving them around so quickly his photoreceptors could hardly parse them.

He was nervous when she told him. Nervous of change. Nervous of it going wrong. Nervous of her ending up like him.

He knows quite a lot about the experience of acquiring a new face, and the adjustment period after. The looking in a mirror, and hardly seeing anything you recognize. Until of course you do.

But Rabbit has seemed excited, ecstatic, even, at the idea of getting a new face. And well- He’d not seen her this happy since… perhaps ever, truly, and it was not as if they would be throwing out the old one. Even if he worried. He wasn't going to tell her that. 

But, well. He does have to admit, now, now that she is complete, that her face turned out very well.

Titanium plating, similar to his own, delicately molded into something he agrees with her is beautiful. She’s never been brighter.

It turned out very well.

Rabbit turned out very well.

He’s happy for her.

Things are, for once, looking up.

…

Things are looking up, it has been a long 120 years.

…

Not everything is sunshine, of course. 

Three years ago, not long after Rabbit’s core started acting up, and not long after her blueprints were re-discovered, still 2013, The Spine, Peter A. Walter VI and Rabbit were in Six's robotics lab. Peter measuring Rabbit's gears to create a new diagram, to map out the changes he’ll make to her form.

The Spine had been sitting in. Part because he had nothing else to be doing, part because Rabbit wanted his opinion on all this, and part because new faces are a sore spot for him. 

It had been a productive session, Peter and her discussing logistics, the what of where of what Rabbit wants. The reframing work that would need to be done to modify her new silhouette to what she wants, the anchor points needed for a longer wig, and how that would interact with the mechanics in her head, what exactly Rabbit wants changed, and what exactly she doesn’t.

It had gotten late, and Peter’s notes had gotten increasingly illegible.

The Spine was mostly listening, but at a certain point of it, he had decided to call it. Point out that perhaps Peter should get some rest, and that this should be resumed when his writing wasn’t chicken scratch. Rabbit had been so excited, though, he'd nearly put it off, but Six was all but falling over on his feet on his desk, and while Rabbit eventually would have remebered humans should sleep, the ducks in the pond outside would have had more legible handwriting than what Six was scribbling down.

Peter had agreed, after sputtering for a few seconds at the insinuation that he obviously needed rest. Sure, Rabbit had called The Spine a buzzkill, for pointing out the limitations of the human condition, but she had been smiling regardless.

Peter left, and Rabbit and him were alone in the robotics lab.

Sitting there, Rabbit's grin wavered, tired herself, and she let herself clunk sideways against his shoulder.

The workshop is quiet without Six in it. With the machines turned off. Lights the only sound, as they humbuzz above. 

“Hey, The Spine?” She said, voice box staticky, “It's kinda shit how Two and Three didn't f-f-f-finish me right, isn't it?”

For a moment, he hadn’t known what to say, as—

Certainly, Two and Three had their flaws, but—

Well. They were born in 1896. And were incredibly imperfect. As humans tend to be. But that all was before Three even enlisted.

“..Shit is an apt way to put it,” He wrapped an arm around her back, “But- You know how it was. Then."

"...y-y-y-yeah."

"They should have done what you wanted, Rabbit."

A lot had happened, then. A lot he hadn't known, really, which was disconcerting. But his memory is patchy from back then regardless.

She was going to be built in design of Delilah Morreo. But Delilah died. The Spine has put together most of it, he thinks.

Building her after Delilah passed was difficult for father. He broke her voice box. Cracked her core. Two couldn't allocate the money to get a new voice model for her when they had a spare him voice box, Three thought building her after a dead woman was distasteful. Iris took issue with having her husbands.... well, ex-partner is not the term, he knows his father and Delilah were never together, but his father was blatantly infatuated with her, and Iris took issue with having a robot modeled after her looking like her around. Not wanting to compete with a dead woman. 

Delilah was not dead. Not that they knew that, then, of course. 

There were simpler issues too, something silly and incredibly 1920s about Upgrade already being a woman, and not needing two in the act. Something about her being too tall for it, and not having the co-ordination they wanted for the part. 

He hadn't known anything about it until recently. But Rabbit was left unfinished. Forever. Until now.

In retrospect, things were... difficult, then. Compared to now. When they were still within a reasonable age to comprehend. In retrospect, The Spine maybe has several complaints, about all of then. With the way Two and Three handled working on them, but...

But Rabbit being finished wrong is a large one.

They should have finished her the way she wanted. That was clear enough.  

The Spine held her, as she talked. About decades of feeling like she was losing it. Jealousy. Anger. Longing.

He let her head slot between his shoulder joint and neck plates. He did not mention anything when oil began to seep from her eyes into his vest. It did not matter.

Besides. He knew a lot of it anyway. Even if the specifics eluded him for far longer than they ought to have. 

He had been the one to find Rabbit and Father in the robotics lab that night when they were both very new. He was— less, then. A lot less experience. A lot less of everything. It was only shortly after the Weekend War, after all. He had brought father upstairs to find help. He had not seen Rabbit for a long while afterward. He'd been still mostly unfinished himself. 

She does not remember the experience clearly. He asked once. She remembers hope, and then none of it, and then none of anything.

He can still remember the ruined voicebox on the floor, and her core, cracked, broken against the wall.

The Spine had thought of things a bit differently after that.

Thought that perhaps it’s better to agree to whatever they say than to be fully broken. Perhaps. Its not easy to shake the image of your sister broken on the floor from your head when you have hardly so much as existed yet. 

(Father had once told him he was built of the strongest metal for a reason. Titanium does not break or warp as easily as brass or copper, neither does it corrode or rust the same. He was to keep them safe in battle.)

(In order to keep his family safe in general, he could not be dismantled like that.)

Rabbit stopped shuddering next to him eventually. He wiped oil tears from her face. Walked her back up to her room.

She was in one piece, and, of course, Peter A. Walter VI was going to mend everything anyone had ever neglected, refused, or ignored. Make her new pieces, make her a new face. Make her herself. 

It was a good situation to be in, despite all the tears.

…

Regardless.

It is 2016. It is not 2013. It is not 1950. It is not 1897.

The Spine has other things to dwell upon than holding his sister as she cries about their Father’s real children finishing in all the wrong shapes. Better things to dwell on than his long dead opinions and poor decisions about who and what they all should be.

Rabbit is finished now.

Rabbit is happier than she ever has been now. And this is a good change.

There are good things on the horizon.

Rabbit is herself, exactly how she wants to be. Tailor-made to her specific requests, asked only by her.

Six had done a good job on her. The best of any Peter before him. He has to admit that, at least.

Six is a good kid. Smart. A little goofy, and a bit too confident, but he's sweet. He listens. And Rabbit laughs louder and smiles wider than he's ever seen her do before. 

(Although, The Spine hadn’t quite realized, until he watched Peter and Rabbit gush over diagrams together, that they were allowed to ask for things.)

(For themselves.)

(Which is of course, another thing, that he should, perhaps, not dwell on, lest ideas get stuck in his head.)

Chapter Text

Soooooo. So. So. Rabbit knows The Spine has problems.

It’s The Spine. Sure, he’s all charming and put together and whatever. Ish. He tries to be. Or whatever. But it’s uh, it’s The Spine?

Like, look at him! Sulking in the hall of wires all day and writing covers about how heartbroken he is and totally not being fucked up about the wars and being so normal. So normal. He wishes. He wishes he were so normal.

Anyway! She’s been doing perfectly lately! Never better, really! And the Spine? He’s jealous. Of her new body and beautiful face. She can telllllll.

He’s jealous. Because he hates how he looks. He has ever since the government took him wayyyy back in ‘55, when they made him look like a discount human from a dollar store. And that was before Vietnam, even, after Vietnam they had worse issues than his face being all wrong, and then uhh, well, then she was too busy wanting to tear her own plating apart to worry about him too much. He was fine.

Sure he hated how he looked. So did she. Join the club, The Spine.

Probably wasn’t the best way to go about things, but eh. It was 1975. Not like they had invented therapy yet.

And regardless, Petesy The Sixth is so good at fixing her problems. He’s great at it. She’s beautiful now!

…

……

…………

Well.

Okay.

Fine.

Maybe she did care. A lot. Too much. Even when she couldn’t do anything about it.

She’d been drowning. Had known it maybe. But it wasn’t like she could say anything.

(The last time she SAID anything she had her voice torn out, and broken, so..)

But watching him slowly look less and less like himself while he took every single upgrade they offered him to stay “futuristic” was kind of.. spooky. Especially as he seemed a bit more disconnected each time he got out of the robotics lab. And then when the government took him, and he got back lookin’ different, actin’ all different, refusing to even talk about it, no matter how she poked or pestered or prodded at him. And then Three was all, you're coming down to my workshop so I can make sure they didn't break you, and he just sorta didn’t even say a word, just agreed, all blank, and unreadable because his new face didn't even emote, and all grim and nervous, under that stupid nonchalance he puts on, and it was—

Spooky. Really. Bad. Because she could tell he wanted to say no, but he didn’t, cuz he’s The Spine, and he doesn’t say no to the Peters, especially not Two and Three, (You couldn’t really say no to Two or Three, at least not in the way you can tell Five or Six to buzz off), and—

It was worrying, right?

Maybe she should have said no for him, or something, or come up with an emergency. But The Spine would have hated that more, and The Jon was freaking the hell out because he didn't really recognize The Spine when he got back, and she sorta had to deal with him because he was just scaring The Spine worse, and it...

There was a lot going on in 1955.

Upgrade went down with him, and so it sucked but it was fine. The Jon figured it out after a bit. And it was all horrible.

And then, y’know. Three fucking died, and Wanda had to piece everything together, and then Vietnam happened, and sure The Spine had all those weapons, after the government took him. Weapons that didn’t even kind of help in the end, and it—

It crushed something in him, being there, in that war, she saw that. 

But also, uhm, she also had her arm torn off? By the time things fell apart? And they all were pretty much entirely broken, Jon’s legs were all ruined, by that point, and The Spine also fucking exploded? Because the weapons sucked? And Upgrade wasn't there, and The Jon was so broken, and things were bad. And then they stopped all being operational, and after all that-

Well she still had bigger problems after, with everything else.

Going up to him and trying to ask 'hey-o Spine-o, so your face is all weird now, but its been like 20 years since that happened, are you normal and well adjusted about this?' Was too hard to even try, because he would never have said anything other than I’m just fine Rabbit or Rabbit, you know I’m alright, I'm always alright. He’d have locked down any issues he has with it further, to spare her worry or whatever he always does when he thinks he's bothering someone. 

But she knows. She does. She really fucking knows what not feeling like you were made right does to you. What looking wrong, and feeling wrong, and being built all wrong does to you. And has problems about it. She can tell and-

And Petesy fixed her better than she ever could have thought possible, with her face, and her frame, and her everything, so—

So maybe she’ll poke at The Spine again, about his face. Maybe. Why not?

It’s 2016. Therapy exists now. Y'know?

She’s beautiful now. She’s finished now. 

Maybe the Spine can look like himself again. Besides, Pete Number Six is a smart cookie. He’d be good about it, excited even, to do that. He likes fixing them properly.

The Spine needs this. Probably. Probably. He’d just have to get over himself and ask.

…

She finds him in the Hall of Wires. Typical.

He’s never anywhere fun. Like the hallway. (She likes the hallway) Or the chair room (You know, the one with the haunted chair). Or the doll room (with all those stupid unhaunted dolls). Or anywhere fun. Like Hatchworth’s pole dancing room. With the poles with legs that dance. 

He’s in the Hall of Wires. And he’s staring down at her from the Wires. Like some stupid kind of snake. Or an evil bat. Or The Spine.

“Hey-y Spineial,” she calls up, “Whatcha doing?”

“That is not my name, Rabbit.” he loops down, hanging from the tail of his body, she waves her hand up at him, trying to grab him, yank him down, but can’t quite reach him.

He has Learned. 

“Yeah yeah yeah-  So, The Slime—”

“Rabbit, that is also not my name.”

“You’re no fun,” steam hisses from her lips as she crosses her arms, narrowing her eyes up at him, “Come down.”

“Must I?” but he’s already moving towards where his body is stored, so she’s convinced him. Sometimes he ignores her up there and she has to climb up, and that’s annoying.

“You’re all freaky like that, The Spine,” she complains, as he lowers himself down, “If you did that at a show, they’d call us Steam Powered Freak Giraffe!”

“Perhaps they would, Rabbit,” steam pours from his joints as he clicks back into his chassis, she waits, as his… little grippy crawly spines he uses to navigate the Wires fold inwards, “But I don’t think Delilah would be much of a fan of that. GG is something of a freak, though.”

Rabbit laughs, and then The Spine is The Spine, and not The Snake Spine, and she can look up at him from a respectable height difference.

Hm. His hat is backwards. He has not noticed.

“Remember that time I stole your hat and your wig fell out of it and down into the bottom of Pete’s lab, and then we couldn’t find it?” she asks, reaching up for it.

He leans back, or tries to, but he’s still locked into the floor for a few more seconds while his chassis locks his head into it.

She plucks it off his head. Turns it around. Watches his eyes narrow. “That was fun.”

“Well, sure, Rabbit.” he reaches up, checks his hat, pauses as he realizes it’s the right direction, then lowers his arm.

Squints up as where one of QWERTY’s cameras are, then turns back to her.

Rabbit grins at him. “Well, that’s not important. Your hat was backwards by the way. Anyway, sooo,” she takes his arm, steers him out of the hall of wires, through the doors, which Pete still hasn’t torn out yet, for some reason, “I’ve been thinkin’, The Spine,”

“What a rare occurrence.”

“Hey!” she shoves him. He hardly budges. Just looks down at her.

She glares up at him. “I was talkin’”

“Of course. Go on, Rabbit.”

“So I was sayin’- all this new uh, me, has me thinking all this nostalgic stuff, The Spine,” she’s walking him to her room, it’s nice in there. More fun than the Hall of Wires, where he can slither out of his body and get away from her.

“Has it?”

And she has to give him credit, there, he’s been so sweet, about all this. Her everything. Even if he’s boring about it. He helped her design her new stage outfit, and brought her clothes shopping.

“Yeah! I was- so Pete made my uh, my face, recently, you know that, and started makin’ me all those wigs. So I have a good amount, so I was thinking about- aaages ago, I guess, and how you used to have all those smokestacks,” she gestures towards the back of his neck, “Remember that?”

Something slight changes in his posture, or maybe in his face, or maybe Rabbit just knows him well enough to know not to mention all that, and is making things up, but he doesn’t respond immediately.

“Of course,” he drawls, finally, slow, shifting a bit as they walk, “They were a rather important aspect of my ventilation systems.”

She swings their arms between them.

“Yeah! Yeah. I know that, The Spine, anyway, Y'know it was kind of messed up the government just uhh, took those. From ya.”

No. There’s definitely something to how he’s holding himself, now, how controlled his expression is.

“Well,” he’s all stilted, in his voice, forced. He’s not looking at her, now. “Yes.”

They reach a flight of stairs. He pulls his arm from hers. She would be offended, or think it's because he’s annoyed, or bothered, but she does perhaps need both arms to balance as she goes up them. He knows that, as he’s seen her fall down plenty of stairs.

Speaking of that, two steps up, she stutters in step. Left leg locking, she tips a bit, hand tightening around the rail. 

“Careful,” says The Spine, his hand finds her shoulder, steadying, as she reaches down and bangs her knee, once, twice, until the spring springs unstuck, and she keeps up the stairs. 

“I’m fine. So anyway, that whole t-t-t-thing, with the government, it was so weird, The Spine.”

His hand leaves her plating, and she hears steam hissing behind her. 

The silence is a bit long. Stretching past the top of the stairs and a bit down the hall.

She’s just about to say something else when he starts again.

“We both know the government invested a lot of money in Walter Robotics, and in the research towards my advancement because of it,” he folds his arms in front of him, so she can't steal his arm back. “And we were, of course, able to keep the manor running on that money and improved me significantly.”

“It was weird, though, wasn’t it?”

Steam pours from the gap between his neck collarbone joint and neck.

“Rabbit,” he says, stiffly. He knows exactly what she’s doing.

But hey! She is poking at things she knows he hates talking about.

“What! I’ve just b-b-been thinkin! If it were me, The Spine, I’d miss having smokestacks. Your heat sink fins are cool and all, but—”

“Honestly, Rabbit,” he interrupts, “That particular change is rather tolerable. I would hit door frames quite often with them. My fins are retractable, and make my name make somewhat more sense at a glance.”

“Oh.” She spares a glance at him, he isn’t looking at her. “Right. I forgot that.”

There’s still steam pouring from every seam he has. That never happened when he had the smokestacks. Or his old face.

She’s fairly sure he’s lying. At least about some of it. He’d disliked the fins at first. She knows that.

They’re coming up on her room, though, as they turn a corner. 

“Well- seems like it was dumb, is all, you didn’t even kind of ask for them to do that, y'know?"

She pushes aside the curtain covering her door frame, holds it open for him to step into her room.

He does, ducking a bit.

(Well. He did use to hit door frames. That isn’t a lie. Pappy made him stupidly tall.)

Her room is nice. Spacious. Wide windows that let in sunlight, overlooking the pond out back. She has the best bed shes found in the last century, her couch, chair, and her things, organized on shelves and piles.

She sits down on the couch, he sits beside her.

“I suppose,” he starts, stiffly, “I do rather miss the... more capable ventilation system I had before. With the smokestacks. And perhaps my old boiler and central gearshaft were a tad more reliable on the day-to-day.”

“Yeah?” She asks, lets herself crash against his side, links their hands.

She can feel how still he is. Can tell how warm he’s getting as his core heats the water in his boiler, can hear his central turbine whirring quickly in his chest.

He’s still next to her a few moments, then he looks up, and a cloud pours from his eyes.

“It seems rather pointless. Many of the upgrades they did then are.. perhaps something of a hindrance.”

She knows. Or figured.

“Huh,” She spares a glance up at his face. Blank expression. Photoreceptors fixed on her photos pinned up on the wall. He’s always been too good at hiding things. “What do ya mean by that?”

“…Well, they did not work. The weapons. Not effectively. You know that, Rabbit.”

She does.

She really does. Vietnam was… a disaster. On all fronts. And for everyone involved.

Still.

She doesn’t know how he stays so still, when he’s upset. Locked in place. Joints so stiff.

“Well, yeah,” She rests her head on his shoulder.

“And I suppose there is the… Integration of it all. Three made everything as seamless as he could, when he did the once over, when they finally gave me back. But he- well, you know, before he could finish the… final checks.”

He died. Stroke and sleep deprivation and crisis about her killing his brother caught up to him. Probably. She doesn’t know how humans work.

“Yknow, The Spine, I didn't like Three that much by the time he sent you there,” she waves their hands around a bit. "He was r-r-rude like, all the time. And he kept making Wanda cry."

She can practically hear The Spine thinking the excuse that Two had just died.

And Two had.

Three also could have done a million things differently and things would suck a lot less right now.

“...I am well aware.” he clicks his fingertips against the back of her hand. “...And if I am to be honest, Three and the Government did not particularly… it is not seamless, I suppose."

He overheats all the time now. He never did before this. She can see heat if she wants to and it's obviously a problem.

"But Five did streamline matters with QWERTY," The Spine continues, "He removed some of the more… miscellaneous hardware. But it is a hindrance.”

“Y'know you can just say he took out some of the experimental weapons, The Spine.”

“You are not supposed to know about the experimental weapons, Rabbit.”

“You weren’t subtle when The Jon’s legs got exploded off!”

“That was war.”

“I do have eyes, The Spine.”

He turns, squints down at her. She lifts his hand up again, holds it out in front of them.

Her fingers are corroded in places. Dulled by the years. She shows her age. His still shine like the day he was made, though some of the metal is newer, he has to replace his fingertips with the picks every so often when they dull or snap.

She remembers when Father powered him for the first time. He opened his mouth to speak, but something was wrong. Oil poured from his lips and onto the floor. Father had torn open his chest, muttering about oil lines, and he was fixed a few minutes later, but she remembers that first look he had, confused. Staggering. He hadn’t what he was, or what anything was, as father changed lines in his chest.

He looked a lot more like her, then. Though she hadn’t even had a voicebox yet.

Father preferred her that way, anyway. Silent. That’s what women were supposed to be. Maybe. Or something. Probably not. She probably just annoyed him.

Silent. What Miss. Morreo would have been forever. Given she died. Until the whole- everything else after.

She tilts The Spine’s hand, hand, watches the sunlight reflect across it and onto the wall. Looks back to his face.

His face.

“I know-know-know you hate the face they gave you.” It's all solid metal, all the way around, more sculpted, with a jointed mouth, like a human if a human looked like bad.

He used to have vents under his eyes, right under the highest point of his cheeks. They removed a lot of the more obvious ones when they remodeled him. Something about wantin’ him to be more human-y for their stupid special missions and not puttin’ any real lives in danger. Like he doesn’t matter. And isn’t a real life.

“..I suppose I do rather dislike it. But really, Rabbit, it is not nearly such a large issue as you are painting it.”

“You know what I think, The Spine?”

“I cannot magically know what you think, Rabbit.”

“I think you should tell Pete.”

He pauses. She can hear pistons in his chest firing quickly, can hear steam hissing out of him. 

“Well Rabbit,” he pauses, “Pete’s a busy young man. Sharp. Didn't you hear about all those new interns?”

“You said it was a problem! Pete loves fixing problems.”

“It's not that terrible, Rabbit. Mildly annoying is all.”

“I thought not being f-f-f-finished was mildly annoying. It was more than that, The Spine.”

“This is different and you know it, Rabbit.”

She sort of disagrees. She wasn’t ever finished. And he was finished and then they just kept adding things. She wasn’t how she was supposed to be. And neither is he.

“I think you should get Pete to put your old face on.”

“I don’t think we even have it, Rabbit.”

“Hmph.” she lets her head clunk sideways against his shoulder. Steam hisses from her neck.

“I am perfectly alright.” he offers, but she knows that isn’t true. “Truly. I am content with this.”

She isn’t.

She spent 116 years pretending to be content.

The Spine will spend twice as long if she lets him.

She makes a decision, then, that she won’t let him.

She pulls away from him, stands up, then takes both his hands. He looks up at her, puzzled.

“Maybe, The Spine, Pete could make you a new face that looks like the old one!”

He looks up at her, unimpressed. “Well maybe. But honestly, Rabbit, it's not that much of a problem, I don't think I need to bother Pete about it—“

It appears she needs to resort to drastic measures.

“Are you sure?” she interrupts, “Because I think you should.”

“I am sure.”

Right then!

She bangs her forehead into his face. Hard. Her new face is reinforced titanium, polished and sharp along the edge. Made to last another century.

He recoils back, still a few moments, then he looks at her. Frowning.

“Oh No!” she says, when he straightens back up.

“Ow, Rabbit. Why?”

“Oh No!” She grabs the top of his head. Tilts his face up to the lights. “Oh No The Spine! It looks like your forehead is dented.”

“Rabbit.”

“It seems to me like you need to be repaired right away. This looks ur-ur-urgent.”

“Rabbit. What are you doing?”

“You can't even walk!”

“I assure you I can walk just fine—”

She grabs a long screwdriver off her shelf. She has it to fix her own screws when she needs to. She Brandishes it at him.

“Hey!” he raises his hands, though, she can tell he’s already resigned to this, “Hey now, Rabbit, no need for violence!”

“Let's go see Pete! You need to get your face fixed right away!”

“This is ridiculous, Rabbit,” he complains, but even as he huffs, he lets her drag him to his feet at screwdriver point anyway.

“Maybe while we’re there you can make a request for Pete to actually fix-fix it!”

“This is ridiculous. I’m fine, Rabbit.” but he does take a step towards the door.

“And you’ll even be less-less-less ugly,” she jokes, grabbing his arm.

“That’s rude, Rabbit,” he says, but it's fond, and she has won.

He takes another step, and they’re on their way.

Chapter Text

“HEY PETESY,” Rabbit would kick open the door to Peter’s lab if he had one. Instead, she screams through the doorframe, because she misses the loud sound it makes, and watches, somewhat gleefully, as Six just about jumps out of his skin and turns towards them.

Some chemical she really doesn’t care about sizzles against the table. He sets down the beaker he was holding, puts his hands on his hips.

"Rabbit! how many times have I—"

“Respect your elders.” She interrupts, drags the Spine into the lab after her, shoves him in front of Peter, “ANYWAY. There is an emergency, Petes, an emergency,”

“Peter,” says The Spine, stupid, wet blanket, buzzkill The Spine. “I apologize if that was any kind of important-“

“Nope! It wasn’t!” Rabbit interrupts, shushing him as she jabs him forward with her screwdriver.

“It sort of was, Rabbit—” Peter starts, but Rabbit shushes him too, waving her free hand wildly in front of his mask.

“Nope! Anyway! The Spine needs to be fixed urgently. His head is dented.”

Peter takes a step back. Stares between them before turning back to his work station, which is melting only a little, then back to the two of them.

The Spine, being The Spine, puts his head in his hands. Or he tries to, because Rabbit grabs his head and drags it down to Peter, pointing at the dent on his forehead. “His Face Needs To Be Replaced.”

“I wanted no part in this Peter.” the Spine says. Rabbit shushes him.

She’s really doing a lot of shushing, huh! Call this a library!

“Oh- oh. Uh,” Peter leans forward, peers at The Spine’s face, “I mean, the workers should be in their stations, still? All that really needs is to be buffed out, I mean, if it’s urgent I guess I could—"

“No, no, he-he-he-he needs a new face,” Rabbit insists, “Preferably a less ugly one that wasn’t made to make him look like a discount human from a-a-a toddlers sculpting class! Oh! Petesy! The Spine has a request for you!”

“What?” Peter asks, looking between them. “The Spine, what is she talking about?”

“…I do not have a request for you.”

“SPINEIAL. Tell him!” she lets go of his head and shakes his shoulders. 

“That is not my name.”

“NOT THAT.”

Rabbit shakes The Spine more.

Steam pours from the seam of Spine’s neck. Hm. Maybe she should speed this along! He’s embarrassed now. 

Sucks for him!

“So,” Peter puts his hands on his hips, frowning, “Either I’m missing something or this isn’t adding up.” He plucks Rabbit’s hands off of The Spine’s shoulders, sets them at her sides. 

Steam hisses from The Spine’s mouth. Rabbit (with her now free hands) pokes him in the side with the screwdriver. He turns, glares at her. She pokes him again. 

“What’s actually going on?” Peter asks, louder, and they both turn to look at him. 

“Nothing, Peter,” Spine says, which is so untrue.

She jams the screwdriver between his elbow joints, he jerks his arm away, “Rabbit,”

“Yes Spine?”

“Stop that.”

“I will not! Unless you tell him.”

The Spine sighs. Long. Weary.

“…Rabbit would like me to inform you that I am not entirely pleased with the state of my face’s aesthetics.”

She pokes him again.

Peter hums, then nods. Listening still. 

“I think—" The Spine pauses, turns, grabs Rabbit’s hand. Holds it still so she stops poking him. “That I would like a—”

He stutters as he says it. So she swings their hands back and forth. Looking sideways at him.

He’s bad at asking for anything. Especially anything like this.

“—A restoration project—” He lingers on the word a moment, “—done, perhaps, to—ah, well, you know what? No, no, no nevermind, this is not all that important Peter, forget I—“

“He wants to look like he did before the government upgraded his face to make him look stupid,” Rabbit cuts in, “And you did a fantastic job on my face, Pete! So you need to make him a normal face to make him look normal and like he’s supposed to again.”

Peter looks between them.“...Right,” his mask settles on the Spine, tilted up slightly, to meet his eyes, “Is that uh, Correct? The Spine?”

“….Yes.” It's begrudging. “I would like a restoration project started.”

He puts emphasis on Restoration, in the word. Hm.

“Oh!” Says Peter, takes a step forward, “Yeah! Okay! Sweet! Totally!”

Rabbit swings her arm around the Spine’s back.

“Yeah uh- yeah, sure! I’d need your blueprints, or at least uh, photos, of how you looked before, to model it on! But that’s- no, that’s easy, The Spine, probably! Or would be, given- I don’t think they did anything more than surface level part modifications- at least on your appearance, either way! Yeah totally, The Spine, I can do that!”

“I’ll find photos,” Rabbit offers, clunking sideways against The Spine’s arm, “And you just have to fix Him!”

“Yeah- uh, no, yeah, okay, um, let me clean this up,” He gestures to the chemical-acid-whatever that spilled, which has now eaten a centimeter into the counter, “And then I can start doing measurements, and- your blueprints were probably with Rabbit’s, I think, so that’ll be easy enough, just uh- give me a sec?”

“You can take your time, Peter.” The Spine starts, and Rabbit can hear, both in how his gears are whirring and the apprehension to him, he’s nervous.

So she’s not going to go anywhere.

“Yeah,” Peter turns around, muttering under his breath as he cleans up whatever that chemical is. “So- uh, The Spine, is it just the face? That you want me to upgrade,” She feels the Spine jolt a bit, at the word upgrade, “Or is it, uh, I’ve seen photos of you with those smokestacks, in the really old photo albums, I could probably make new ones of those, too?”

“Just my face for now, please.” There’s something off about his voice, and she squints up at him.

Ohhhhh.

“Petesy these aren’t upgrades,” Rabbit announces, “They’re uhh, repairs, or something,”

Rabbit doesn’t engage with the WIFI as much as Zero, or The Jon, or The Spine do. Upgrade leaves everyone on read all the time, and Hatchworth uses almost only emojis.

But she does read messages flagged priority, especially when the Spine sends them from right next to her.

“Nevermind uh- The Spine just said he likes the word Restoration, most, so you’re calling them that, not upgrades,” She announces, and The Spine puts his head in his hands.

“Now he’s embarrassed because I had to say that and not him.”

Pete looks over his shoulder at them, a moment, then throws a bundle of what he was cleaning up into the incinerator access trashcan. Before turning around.

“Restoration. Got it.” He does a thumbs up. “Cool cool. Okay. Uh. Restoration,” he says every syllable deliberately, as he peels off his gloves and tosses them into the incinerator as well. “And it's just your face, for now?”

“For now.” The Spine confirms.

“Love that! Faces are fun. Right, come uh, come over here, sit, sit, let me figure out how that one’s attached, and then we can figure out the details on the new one,” Peter presses a button on the wall, and a table unfolds from the floor. “Probably tomorrow though, because it is late,”

The Spine steps forward. Rabbit follows, hops onto the table next to him.

She’s not going anywhere.

(The Spine’s no good at saying no, anyway, and sure, Pete Six is her favorite Peter, but someone needs to tell him no when he gets too ambitious about fixing The Spine, anyway.)

…

Rabbit is folded against his side. Her hand links into his, holding his hand close. Her head is swiveled to stare at Six as he tinkers.

Usually, The Spine would push her away from him. Insist that he is fully operational and does not need her to baby him. He is not a baby. He is 120 years old. But.. he quite appreciates her pair of eyes right now, because his have been taken out.

When was the last time he was being measured to be fitted with new parts? Surely it was—hm. It would have been after Vietnam, when Five was fixing them. He had needed most of his internals replaced, after a poorly installed weapon had rather- backfired, inside him, rendering him mostly inoperable.

He had not been aware nor operational for that, for the most part. Occasionally Five had managed to power him on, hooked him to external parts, but he was- rather destroyed. Then. And most of the repair work was done without him present mentally.

But that is not here nor now.

Six has two fingers holding his head still as he unscrews his face off. It's more of a project now than it ever was before 1955. His face, neck, and the back of head are all one piece, jointed in spots, but all one piece. Removal and repair is hindered by that.

Peter nearly has it all off though.

The Spine tries to recall what happened while they were remodeling him in 1955. It is fragmented. They kept him inoperable or broken for most of it, and typically refused to answer his questions the rest when he was powered on.

He had not been particularly fond of the aesthetic changes made. He had accepted them as nessessary.

The weapons had not even properly worked, in the end.

Rabbit bonks her head against his shoulder, and he stops thinking about it.

(Thinking about it too much is a bad idea. Especially when Six is so preoccupied with him right now.)

(He will make himself too nervous about screws being taken out)

He had not been able to recognize himself for years, after they worked on him. He still doesn’t really. He is so different now. He’s hardly the same robot, after the government worked on him.

But he has adapted. Which is close enough to acceptance, perhaps.

Perhaps Peter Six is the best to do this. He already finished Rabbit’s face. And he knows what losing his was like, so perhaps—

Peter finishes with that last screw, and The Spine feels his face be pulled forward. Off of him. Unplugged. It's heavy, and he has to take a moment to rebalance himself without it.

Perhaps he leans against Rabbit a little, lets her balance him as he reorients to the lack of added weight. But he would not admit to this, even as Rabbit steadies him.

Steam pours out his neck.

It’s rather odd, not having steam collect in the spaces beneath his face. He runs too hot now, has run far too warm for longer than he hasn’t. Ideally, if Peter does redo his face, more ventilation in his head will fix that problem either way.

But he feels- clearer, as his boiler releases steam to open air. Exhaust open, no capped off stacks. Like he was designed to.

That had been one of the only complaints he’d voiced, when Peter A. Walter III was making certain they hadn’t broken him. He’s said that without his smokestacks, and without proper ventilation, steam it would collect too much. Perhaps he’d rust, or corrode internally. Or run far too hot, as he already was.

Three had grit his teeth. Stood up from his desk, started pacing. 'I'm aware' He had said, pointed, nearly vicious. 'I'll get to it when I get to it, The Spine.'

Three hated what they'd done to him more than The Spine did, maybe. Three hated that he didnt know how he worked so thoroughly. Hated being outdone. Hated that The Spine stood out in the act. 

'The fins should sink enough of the heat that it won't damage you short-term, and the internal cooling system of fans is suitable for now. I'll add proper ventilation when I find the time. Now for God's sake let me work."

Three hated a lot back then. 

Of course, then Three had gotten sick, and sicker, and never quite did ‘get to it’ - nor find the time.

He had a rather short amount of it left, as it turned out.

Then they were sent to Roswell, soon after that, Four died, or didn’t die, or half died, and then they were shipped off to that last war, and..

Well, it never seemed worth bothering Five about, when he’d finally had a chance too. He’d gotten used to it, by then, anyway.

Even if he was still running far too hot.

(Even if, as his systems needed more energy to keep turning, the problem got a bit worse.)

(He runs well enough. He does not run as smoothly as he did 50 years ago. Or 100 years before that. That has always been inevitable.)

It was never worth asking Five about.

It was not going to be worth asking Six about, but… 

Rabbit has her way with things.

“Wow, uh, hm, that’s- hm.” The Spine hears Peter say, “That’s some- interesting soldering. Did- did my great uncle do that? Hm, And quite the- hm. Hack job. With this bit here—” Peter’s fingers ghost over the sawed off end of one of his smokestacks, at the base of the back of his neck, and—

Well, The Spine doesn’t particularly mean to jerk back, but he doesn’t-

He doesn't really like being touched there.

Peter hisses in pain, though, and The Spine freezes.

In the photo she sent, Peter’s finger is sliced open, he’s pulling back.

Oh.

He feels stuck.

He didn’t mean to do that.

He hurt Peter.

He doesn’t like hurting people.

Oh.

“I’m fine,” Says Peter, quick, “But ow, sharp, sharp metal,”

“I apologize—” The Spine starts, but Peter cuts him off.

“No! No, you’re the one who- shoot, one sec, The Spine”

Rabbit’s hand grips his, vicelike, the image is focused on the sawed off smokestack that sat at the base of his neck, it had been the tallest one, when he had them. The main channel steam exited his body through.

(Often, he would crash into doorframes with it.)

(That's not the point.)

Where its cut is unsanded, horrible looking. Slanted slice, awkward, jagged, done quickly, if he recalls, done carelessly, if he recalls. They had been running short on time, and needed him done before the deadline. The sawblade had broken hallway through, slipped forward, skipping the stack and cutting a gouge into his then-head. The back of it.

No one had cared that it severed a dozen wires inside his head. They were all being replaced anyway. They had not quite cared how disoriented he was after, as they worked. How his voicebox was unresponsive, how he couldn’t clearly think. 

Most of his smokestacks had been removed much more carefully. They were sawed short, yes, but they were patched gracefully and smoothly. Not left jagged. After all, they were installing his spines instead of them. The area needed to be functional. 

The cosmetics beneath his plating, where nothing new was to be put in, was not particularly important. Especially for redundant parts being removed. Especially when they were already hurrying to finish.

He does not feel hurt.

He is a robot.

It had not been pleasant. They had blamed him for moving. He had certainly not moved. They hadn’t had another saw handy, and had removed the rest of it with a hammer and a metal wedge.

He had not quite been able to do much at the time. He had not been able to make his voicebox coordinate with his wiring. He had not been able to ask them to at least turn him off for this.

The Spine has actively avoided looking too keenly at the more detailed changes they made to his neck and face and back in 1955, reasoning that what he remembers when he was on and operational was probably just as bad as when he was off, if not worse. So long as there were no mechanical failures, he has rather sort of… ignored it.

Rabbit wraps her arm around his back, he can hear her eyes focusing on Peter, watching.

(He is… very glad she is here.)

“Okay! Everything is Fine! Bandaid. Bandaid acquired. And gloves! I have gloves now, The Spine, let me see that again,”

He feels Pete’s hand land on his shoulder, holding him still,

“So—okay, that’s got to go, if that's alright? or- huh. Do you not have any ventilation back here now? The Spine? That’s not- can I fix- shoot - restore that? I need to redo your shoulder plating anyway, since—”

“Petesy he just wants a new face,” Rabbit interrupts, “We can save-save-save that for later.”

But— well.

That doesn’t sound too bad, really.

“I don’t think I’d mind that one,” He speaks up, “But ah- perhaps just leave it a vent, instead of a stack, Peter, it was rather annoying ducking for door frames.”

“Sweet. Got it. Normal vent. No smokestack. Here. Right. Okay! Time for measurements!”

“I am sorry for cutting your hand.” He says, because he needs to. 

“No, no, that’s- no, no. I’m sorry someone went at you with a saw, and didn’t even clean it up after, anyway, measurements! Then I’ll reassemble all of you, and I’ll get a new face manufactured, and make sure you like it, make sure it looks right,”

Peter’s crouched over him in the photo, measuring stick pressed to the internals of his face.

He hears Peter muttering numbers to himself, centimeters, millimeters, hears him scratch them down on a paper.

He pauses, just as he starts counting screw driving holes along his jaw.

“Spine, someone did a lot of rushing here on your face,” Peter taps along the side of his jaw joint, “This was bent, when they were- Who knows, what they were doing, did they drop you? Not- not the point, I’ll need to account for the odd angle there. I doubt you want structural work done— and not to mention all this shoddy metalwork— Nothing I can't restore, but- I’m not a fan. Not at all. Anyway, uhm— The Spine, actually, can you show me that range of motion on your jaw joint?”

The Spine opens his jaw as far as he can. Feels Peter move the hinge back and forth. Open and shut.

Hears him scribble more numbers down, under his breath.

She’s not wrong.

They had to replace his jaw three or four times, due to redesigns of the way his mouth was to work. Wired and unwired, voice coder linked and unlinked, he had nearly forgotten.

The screws were stripped, the third time, or at least the third time he was operational for, and had to be drilled out.

He had not enjoyed that, particularly much.

He does not know if he ever fell on his head there. It would not be surprising. He is very heavy and oftentimes was rather broken.

“So! Okay, Spine, Right, I was worried there, for a moment, because that’s not your original jaw piece, I can tell, given your old mouth- didn't work the same, but I can work with it! I can, I’d need to change out those gears to be the proper ratio, but that's nothing… Anyway, Spine,”

He hears Peter scribbling, Rabbit sends a photo of him crouched over a clipboard, sketching the intervals of his head, numbers, and angles adjacent. 

“Would you want a prototype face, while we make the real one? So we can uh- I’d rather fix all these venting issues, sooner, because- not great! It can’t be all that functional, for you, and that’d give us time to work out issues, and me to make sure all my measurements are right.”

“That seems reasonable,” It will be an adjustment period anyway. Better to work out issues before the final one. Better to minimize problems so he never has to do this again. 

“Okay! Cool cool cool, I might— you’re mostly built like Rabbit, in here, slightly different measurements, though, slightly, so I can use a lot of the uh, diagrams, from that, just- resize, accordingly! and of course make it look right, with uh, your blueprints and the photos, but I could have a prototype done umm, in a few days! Probably! I’ll redo your ventilation then, and uh- we’ll workshop problems, while I figure out details! On the right appearance.”

He whacks Rabbit in the face.

“This is acceptable Peter. Thank you.”

“You hit me!” Rabbit says, “I’m your eyes, Spine, you can’t hit me!”

She sends another photo anyway, immediately after. It's Peter holding his papers up, diagrams, for them to see.

He’s very transparent with what he’s going to do. No sudden surprises. They’re allowed to see the notes.

It’s an improvement, perhaps. Three would do whatever he wanted to make them run the way he desired them too. Even before Two passed. He had very strong opinions about what Steam Man Band should be.

“Course! Of course! Glad to help, and uh- do you have a preference? On um, the vents? On your face- Or just- Actually! You know, we can work on that later! When you have eyes, and when I have the references I need, to properly get this show rolling, I only have a few more photos to take, of this uh, damage, to your jaw and neck, and then once I have your blueprints I should be pretty much set, to um, make this happen!”

It's quicker, from there, and  The Spine feels something adjacent to fine with it. Actually. Especially with Rabbit bickering with Peter about who's taking photos of who, for who, into his microphones. 

He rather zones out, letting Rabbit drone on, it's easier to unfocus, sometimes, enter idle, and not think about the last time this was done to him.

Then Peter is pressing his photoreceptors back into their ports, and the video feed coming back online brings him back into attention.

Steam presses through the seams of his eyes, as he looks around, to Six, who is perhaps flagging a bit energy wise, and Rabbit, who he has, at some point, apparently, fully leaned against. Her arm holds him steady, though, and-

Although somewhat mortifying, he would rather it be that then be in here alone. 

Capped off again, he’s already beginning to run too hot, and The Spine is, in fact, quite glad he will be regaining a proper ventilation system again.

Six looks tired, holding a bundle of notes. He magnets them to the wall. Stretches out, up, before turning back towards them.

“Well! I’m beat! I’ll be working on this all tomorrow, you two can uh, stay in here, a bit, if you need, but I am going to bed.” He sounds- not quite worried, but Rabbit waves him off. 

Probably just the state his head is in, he figures. It would perhaps be worrisome, to someone who did not know.

Peter turns around, snagging his cane from the counter, before taking his leave. His steps get further and further down the hall, and the Spine is- 

He is fine. He is.. Fine?

It’s quite late. The Workers will all be asleep in their quarters, now.

Which leaves just him and Rabbit in the laboratory. 

He is—

Perhaps fine is an exaggeration. 

He does not quite expect the sudden crashing nervousness he feels, not quite, nor the sudden dread as he realizes what he has committed to. But Rabbit is already there, though. And he’s already wrapped in one of her arms. 

He turns towards her, but she’s already wrapping her arms around him, letting him lean down, slot into her arms fully. 

Peter’s freshly connected the oil lines to his photo receptors. He could claim that the oil leaking from them is from the recent install, but as steam pours from the few cracks he does have for it to pour from, and as his central turbine shaft begins to spin so quickly the steam will not slow, he knows he could not make that excuse work.  

He feels raw inside.

He is very glad, right now, that Rabbit is right here.

“Six is going to do-do-do-do much better than t-t-t-they did,” Rabbit says, “He made me beautiful, he’ll do a good job with yours,”

Rabbit’s hand presses down against the smooth plating on the back of his neck, above they sawed off his smokestack, The Spine shudders.

“Petesy won’t do what they did, The Spine, He finished me, he’ll help you.”

He hopes so.

He really does hope this will not be another mistake, all over again.

“A-a-a-nd he knows all about not havin’ the right face, Spine, he would tell me about that, when he was making mine, he won’t do it wrong, he knows what it's like,”

“I’ll be alright.” he says, into her gears.  

“I love you, The Spine.” she says, but she is holding him, which is more than proof enough of its truth. 

He doesn’t have any words left to say, not really, so he just lets her hold him.

“I’ll be alright.” he says again, and she just pulls him closer.

Peter will do a good job of it. Probably. Six is detail oriented. Certainly it could not be worse than what he is currently dealing with. Right?

Right?

Chapter Text

Rabbit is looking for photos. 

Rabbit knows they have photos. 

They were the 8th and a half wonder of the world for a while! right? So of course there are photos! She’s seen them, she used to have so many old ones up in her room! All over the place! So they should all be in albums, or in frames, or in boxes, in the basement archives.

Should be. Or so she thought they would be.

Because Rabbit apparently did not know that QWERTY had, for SOME REASON, taken it upon himself to organize the archives, AGAIN, which means nothing is where she thought it was and the answer to “Heyo QWERTY!! Where are the photos from before 1955?” is ㅤIDK RABIT LOLZ HAHAHA ROFL, WANT 2 HEAR SOME JAZZ??? WE HAVE A LOT OF JAZZ N SOUL ⬇ HERE RN!ㅤ

So… Rabbit has been… looking. And looking. And looking. And looking more. And she’s boredddd.  

She has to find at least one photo, though. Pappy’s diagrams are so old, right? They’re from when they were going to be sent to fight the elephants, and so they're all different, they were all different looking then, and Pappy didn’t even get the chance to finish them all, he’d only really started finishing her and—

And he kinda Ripped Out Her Voice instead of finishing her and broke her and poisoned himself with her and nearly died, and—

And then he was sick, and it was all her fault, and then he didn’t work on them, because she upset him, and then Two and Three decided to finish them instead and—

And that's not important! None of that is, because the diagram of The Spine Pete Six found with hers won’t be the right face anyway! So she has to find photos.

She has to.

(Two might've kept around his notes on them, but a lot of what Two was working on got vaporized with him, and that's even worse to think about.)

…

After she broke down, and after Pete found her blueprints, a lot of things changed. Quickly. 

Really quickly.

Her core was fixed, to start, but that's— that’s whatever. It's nice but—

But she was finally going to be finished. 

Actually really truly finished. As herself. Not as him. Not the clockwork man. As her. A clockwork woman.

As herself. For once. For the first time. Herself.

So— Anyway, anyway, anyway. Anyway. The Spine was there with her. Through the whole. It. That. Rebecoming. 

He was there.

He took her clothes shopping the day after Six cleared her for leaving the robotics lab. 

Pete figuring out how to fix her took a few weeks, and she’d spent that time stuck. Stuck in the lab. Stuck being turned off and on and off and on and off and on as Six poked around with her core. Stuck in that chair, lights in her chest, bored.

She was a she, though, as he worked, and that was kind of nice, but—

It was only after he cleared her for exit that anything happened. 

She didn’t have any ideas for her new outfit, then, or any outfit at all. She didn’t have any of her new body yet either, none of the new shaping, none of her new wigs, none of her new face, none of it at all. 

But still. 

The Spine took her clothes shopping. He took her shopping just to find something she didn’t hate.

She didn’t ask him too, she didn’t even say anyone should, he just did.  

Her core was sealed, her outer shell reconstructed, all in one piece. 

He pulled her out of the manor, outside. Had their driver bring them to a store, just to find something for her to wear.

She’d spent too long hating what she wore, he’d said, it didn’t matter if it isn't perfect, he’d said, as long as she thought it was okay and not awful it was better than any other clothes she had.

They weren’t coming up with a stage outfit. They just needed to find something she liked.

She’d been nervous, so nervous, standing there in the women’s section. They hadn’t known what size she was, and she hadn’t known what she even wanted.

A skirt? A dress? She’d stared at the options, him at her side, stuck there. Frozen.

This was allowed. But she didn't know how.

But he pulled her forward, after a few horrible seconds of stuck. More confident than she could ever have been, and asked her if she liked a dress on a mannequin, gestured up to it, when she said it was maybe okay, he grabbed an armful of different sizes, and just had them get started.

She’d been seen, for the first time, as he passed her that first nice black dress. Walked her to the fitting rooms, fabric pooling in her arms. 

She changed into it. Mostly, at least. Stared at herself in that mirror for what must have been minutes. She felt like herself.

For the first time, she felt like she was actually herself. That she could step into her own body, and soon she was laughing, stepping out from the door, twirling as the dress swished around her legs, like she was always supposed to have, always supposed to wear. 

He zipped up the back of it for her. Took off the tag. Told her that they would pay for it as they left. She didn’t need to take it off while they looked for more. 

Sure, that's not how clothes stores work. 

But who cared? She was herself now.

She’d dragged him back to the clothes to pick more skirts, more shirts, more everything. He held everything she picked out. Did the lacing on the back of another dress. Helped zip up several others. 

By the time they left, with a new wardrobe for her, she looked something close to pretty.

She had, in that store, been his sister for the first time. He’d made sure of it.

He’d made positively sure of it.

…

So she needs to find a photo. Just one or three good ones. 

If it means The Spine feels just a bit less like she did. Less wrong. Less like he’s been slotted into a body that isn't his, she has to. She has to.

If he just feels a bit more himself it’s worth it. He spent weeks helping her design her stage outfit after taking her shopping. He made sure she felt like herself. She can do the same.

She has to find what's left of his old face for Six.

Sorting through boxes, with QWERTY helping her move things she finds so much stuff. Old hats, old clothes, old paintings, old chairs, old music.

But not much in the tune of photos.

It's frustrating. 

Because it’s just—

The Spine doesn’t need help, usually, ever. If anything, he’s usually the one helping her. If one of her legs gives out on a staircase landing, she can bother him into helping her. Or if she gets too stuck on a word, he can distract while she resets her vocal systems, he’s The Spine. And sure, she makes fun of him, but he needs to be humbled sometimes.

But he doesn’t need help usually. And he’d be down here himself probably, if she hadn’t sicced The Jon on him for a while to keep him from it. He’s thinking too much about his face, and yeah, it's kind of her fault, but it's a problem.

It's been a problem.

He needed a distraction, and she’s going to do this for him.

If he could feel even a fraction of himself the way she does these days, now, he needs to. And she needs to make that happen.

When Peter was taking his face off, it was—

She didn’t like how bad it was. 

She didn’t like how she didn't even know how bad it was. He didn’t tell her. 60 years and counting and she didn’t know. He kept the fact they pretty much snapped off one of his smokestacks just…inside him. 

Not telling anyone, apparently. Like that's a fine thing to have happened to him! Like that's something that should just be swept under the rug, ignored, never even mentioned. 

He’d gotten all weird after Peter noticed it, and gotten progressively quieter after. He stopped talking, stopped moving. Pete noticed, tried to get his head on faster than he did taking it off. Because Pete cares. And he’s actually good at this. 

But The Spine did get all weird. 

It wasn’t that he shut off, he just— stopped being there, a little bit, as Pete worked. Leaned against her more, let her steady him. Manage balance for them both. Not how he usually does, she was the one holding him up.

That's weird. That’s not normal. 

Pete had outright asked her if he was doing alright, after he’d been still and quiet for long enough. She’d said probably. She’d fully expected him to cut in then, say he was more than fine, but he hadn’t. 

He’d just kept on blankly leaning against her. He hadn’t even responded. 

And that was answer enough for both of them. That he was apparently not even listening now.

A rather obvious no, he's not okay.

Pete had gotten him put back together soon enough, and then The Spine straightened up like nothing happened the moment his photoreceptors were back in. Like he hadn’t been so far gone he hadn’t even noticed Pete worrying.

Peter. Worrying. In front of him. Not a word!

Then Peter left, and he spent long enough clinging to her he mortified himself into running off again.

Because that's what he always does. Run off. Not let himself admit he could ever just need a bit of help. 

She just wishes he’d talk to her instead of letting himself implode. She wishes he'd, just once, tell her he was doing bad actually.

She's tired of all the I'm fine’s when he so very clearly isn't. 

Rabbit watched him be changed. Be changed again and again and again and again, in ways he hated, still hates. Changed in ways that made him uncomfortable, in ways he didn’t want. Never saying no. Never saying he didn’t want it. Never saying anything.

Agreeing and agreeing and agreeing to let them do whatever to him, quiet and complacent and outwardly so so so fine.

And no one really noticed! No one noticed he hated it! Except her. 

He hides it. He deflects questions, ignores his own issues, lets them keep going and going and going. He’s good at that, hiding it. But she noticed. She did. Because he got more and more like her. Year after year. He got more like her. Wired all wrong. Looking all wrong. Being so wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

She was never what she was supposed to be. He was exactly what he was supposed to be, and now he’s not.

He had it taken from him.

She’s mostly still in her original copper. He’s not. He’s nearly none of his original silver and titanium. He’s so different, and this is-

This will help him.

He hates the face they gave him. He stopped recognizing himself in reflections after he got it. He avoided mirrors for years. She noticed. She noticed because she’s always done that. Avoided reminders of how wrong she is. Avoided that grief, that disconnect, that sinking feeling of everything being so so so wrong and knowing exactly what right is, but just not being able to get there.

And he had that. Being himself. Before this.

Then they upgraded him. Modernized him. Futurized him. Broke him.

It pisses her off.

But she couldn’t say anything then, didn’t even know how too, and—

And she didn’t know what to do, then. After all, she was never even right once. How could she make him be right again?

So she has to find photos. 

Because he never asks for help. Never admits anything is wrong. Never lets her help him. 

But right now he’s letting her. 

So she has to.

She has to.

…

It takes something like forever until Rabbit finds The Box. The one she recognizes as the Good Old Photos Box. QWERTY said he forgot what was in it. That maybe he shuffled it all around and swapped boxes, and if he had, Rabbit would find his power box and tear out all the wires in it herself.

But as she creaks it open, QWERTY peering over her shoulder, it’s everything she was looking for. 

The World’s Fair posters from 1935. And photos. Photos and photos and photos of them, on stage, and importantly, photos of The Spine.

With his actual face, and his smokestacks, before they broke him.

Perfect.

She gathers them up, and starts back upstairs.

He’s going to get his face back. And it's going to be perfect.

She needs to show him the photos.

She needs to. 

…

The Spine’s not in the Hall of Wires for once, when she finds him. Instead, he’s outside with The Jon! 

They were the kitchen when she left them. The Jon had, at the time, been rooting through the fridge for hot sauce, for his hot sauce party, which he was planning. (Maybe she’d reminded The Jon of the hot sauce party to keep The Spine occupied, but no one can prove that). But the kitchen is like, right inside. So basically the same spot. They’re just outside now. 

Unimportant. Anyway!

The Jon is cartwheeling about the lawn, as she approaches, framed photos stacked in her arms,

The Spine is standing there, hands on his hips, planted beneath the tree (The tree is very large now. She remembers when it was planted.), watching The Jon as he cartwheels. Rabbit halts next to him. Decides she can also watch. 

He just keeps going?

Then Upgrade steps out of the garage, and, unfortunately, in a loud clang, The Jon cartwheels directly into her.

She hears The Spine stifle a laugh as they stare at the wreckage.

Buuuuuuut, staying and watching means The Spine will get distracted, and she does not want to wait around for that.

“Well!” Rabbit grabs the Spine’s arm, tries pull to him away, “That’s not our problem, The Spine”

The Jon’s arm thrashes once where he lays in the grass. Upgrade tries to roll on to her back. They’re perhaps a little tiny bit stuck like that.

Which is not her problem! Hatchworth or Zer0 or the Workers can deal with it!

“…I suppose it is not.” The Spine doesn't quite move, still, as he stares at the two of them.

“They can figure it out!” She tries to pull him again, starts talking.

Or she tries to start talking. But she can tell she won’t finish the word just as she starts it, but by then it's too late to not start it. 

“Anyway-way-way-way-way-way-way—”

It's infuriating. That this happens to her. 

She’s still never letting anyone tinker with her voice again. Never letting anyone rip out her words again.

Her head snaps to the side, as she glitches. She takes a step wrong, unsteady, shoulder twisting in, hand jerking where she clutches the frames, so violently she nearly drops the photos. Would have, if The Spine hadn’t reached down to grab them so she didn’t.

It takes her a moment to refocus, to figure out where her neck ends and her arm begins. She keeps accidentally throwing her arm sideways or having her head tick again as she resets her systems.

She lets The Spine take the photos after half a minute of it, because it takes effort to make her circuits stop shorting. 

By the time she manages to stop, Upgrade, across the yard, has started punching The Jon. But they’re way over there, and that’s not important, because she has photos.

The Spine raises an eyebrow, asking, silent, if she’s alright. She nods, she’s fine now.

She’s fine now. Totally. Only mildly maybe needs to restart herself fully. But she doesn't have time for that!

“I found photos! From the 19-1935 World Fair!” Her hand jerks at her side. She quite wishes it would stop.

Shes fiiiine. Fit as a fiddle. Fit as a 120 year old robot. Fit as anything!

“Have you?” The Spine regards her, then the frames he’s now holding. 

He walks to the lawn chairs, sitting down to examine them.

The Jon, in the grass, over yonder, has bitten into Upgrade’s wig. From what Rabbit can see, from allll the way over here, it is now tangled in his jaw joint. The Spine looks up briefly as Upgrade screeches mostly static at The Jon.

“Perhaps I should really—” He starts, staring at the two of them.

“They can figure it out!” Rabbit steps between him and them, blocking his view, “Photos! I’ve been looking for HOURS The Spine. Hours! I need you to see them.”

The Spine tilts, leaning past where she’s hidden them, squinting at The Jon and Upgrade. Then he shrugs, looks back down to the images. 

The best photo she found is a profile view of him, sharp, perfect contrast. He’s playing his guitar in it, mouth open. Sun reflecting off his face. 

The details of where the vents in his cheeks were, and how his jointed jaw was structured once upon a time are more than clear. It's exactly what they were looking for. 

There are a few photos from the front. Others from a distance.

They clearly show how he used to look. 

He sorts through them, gingerly, as Rabbit leans over him.  

“….I had nearly forgotten what I was supposed to look like.” His voice is quiet, too quiet. He lifts up one of him talking to the crowd, holds it to the light.

Oh. There is oil in his eyes. Gathering Quickly. Oh. Oh no. 

“Well- Now you won’t!” She reaches, grips his shoulder, somewhat nervous, suddenly, “Because Pete’s gonna fix you,”

He wipes oil from his photoreceptors, quickly. Then he holds the frames back to her.

“Would you bring these to Peter?” He presses them into her hands. “I am going to go make sure those two do not break each other,”

“Are you—”

“I am fine, Rabbit, thank you.” He stands, on his feet quickly, turns from her.

Why is he always running from her?

Steam hisses out of his joints, a lot of it, “Or I will be. Soon. Do not worry about me. Bring them to Peter.”

“The Spine-” She sets down the photos, reaches for him, but he’s already stepped out of her reach, towards The Jon and Upgrade.

She takes a step forward, closer to him, but he is much faster than her, especially these days, and she stands there, watching, as he crouches down to untangle Upgrade’s wig from The Jon’s mouth. 

She watches a few moments. He must go through a quarter of his boiler just crouching there, before the steam stops billowing so thick.

Pete had said something about his ventilation being bad, hadn’t he?

She just wishes he would talk to her.

…

She leaves the photos in Pete’s lab, on his desk, with a trail of sticky notes with arrows leading to them. To make sure he sees them.

She also decides, as she scribbles the last one, that she should maybe go check on The Spine. And by maybe, she means absolutely, because he seemed upset out there. And if he isn’t going to talk to her normally then she’ll just have to check on him. 

She waits just inside the manor, watches from the window for him to come inside. 

The Jon and Upgrade are still bickering outside, though neither of them are on the ground now. Upgrade’s wig is off her head, somewhere in the grass, and her and The Jon seem to be gesturing at it.

That is not her problem. 

Her problem is The Spine. Who is still just standing there. Next to them. Still practically boiling through himself, steam picked up in the breeze. 

She ambushes him at the entrance, when he finally goes inside, minutes later, holding out a water bottle to him, almost accusatory. 

He stutters, when he sees her, tracking between her face, and the water. 

“Refill your boiler,” she pushes the water into his hand, “You’re always telling me to keep mine full, and I don't make enough cl-cl-cl-cl-clouds to cause a rainstorm.”

“Rabbit I’m perfectly—”

“The Spine. Refill your boiler.” She puts on her best or else voice, hands on her hips, and glares. 

He drinks the water.

A sip, at first, then as she leers at him, pours all of it down his throat to where his boiler sits. 

“Good!” She says, steps forward, takes the empty plastic, tosses it into the recycler, “Now tell me what's wrong.”

“Nothing is wrong, Rabbit—”

“No.” She steals his arm, starts walking him to the hall of wires, that's his spot, he likes it there, “You were upset.”

“I am fine, Rabbit, there is nothing wrong, and I am not upset.” He tries to pull away.

Liar.

She locks her arm in place, stopping mid-step. Lets her feet clunk to the ground. 

“The Spine, w-w-w-what is the problem?” she asks, “Do I need to tell Peter to stop this?”

“No—” The Spine says, fast enough and certain enough she’s sure he means it, “Rabbit, I did just say that I am perfectly fine.”

She doesn’t believe that.

And he’s not. 

He hasn’t been. 

And she’s so tired of him deflecting and pretending he’s okay.

She’s been thinking about things too much. 

About how he didn’t hear when Six asked if he was okay, yesterday.

About how Five put him together first, after Vietnam. Instead of her.

About how when he returned back then, Three brought him to the workshop before he could so much as greet them all, before they could so much as ask a single question about his new face. 

About how frozen he was as Three walked him in, how clearly the last thing he wanted was more work done.

About how she should have told Three to leave him be, for a while. Should have put herself between them. Should have stalled, maybe. Should have pulled him into her arms.

They broke him, and he didn’t even tell her.

So she digs her feet into the floor, and keeps his arm locked against hers, staring up at him.

“The Spine. Do I need to tell Peter this isn’t happening? I should have told Three to get away from you, back when he was looking through you when we got you back from the government, you didn’t want him to touch you. Is this like that?”

“Rabbit that wouldn’t have changed any of this.”

“You were scared of Three then.” She cuts in, “And you’re scared of Six, aren’t you?”

“You were finished wrong by Two and Three, and Three never listened after 1950 anyway—”

“Six does. Did with me. He listened very well. Do I need to tell him that this isn’t happening?”

“I want him to replace my face, Rabbit,” he manages to pull his arm away from her. Lifting his arm up and away, he takes a step back. 

She knows she can’t catch him if he makes a point of leaving. Still. She stares. 

“Then what is the problem?” She presses, “If you want him to?”

“Nothing, Rabbit,”

She is so, so tired of him lying to her.

“Walter Robot Zero-Two: The Spine, What is wrong?”

“Rabbit.”

“Spine.”

“Fine!” He throws his hands up, walks to the table, kicks a chair, the leg breaks off as it lands, he’s steaming clouds through the kitchen, “I am worried somehow it will end up worse. I am being irrational. Peter has been very communicative and has proven that he is more than capable of designing reasonable faces.”

“That is not irrational—”

“Yes, Rabbit, it is.” 

“We thought Five was fine.” she argues, waves her hands around, “Then he did that to The Jon.”

“Six has been very clear. He will be improving my ventilation and remodeling my face to be more similar to the older design. I will have a prototype to find any problems, and we will iterate until I am pleased with it.” 

There’s so much steam pouring from his seams he’s probably gone through half the water she just gave him already. 

She can see sparks jumping inside him. Inside his chest cavity to down his arm.

Ah. The Tesla coil gun. 

 Probably a bad sign. Still. She steps forward. 

He takes one back. An arc of electricity jumps from his hand to the wall. 

“Spine?” she takes another step to him, reaching out, “Just talk to me,”

He doubles forward, then, grasping at his head. His face. Fingers pressing against too smooth, solid metal, where there should be vents. Should be anything but metal cast into a face.

“Fine.” He’s jittering, in his voice, “I am still afraid, Rabbit, and it is pointless. I am afraid it will become worse than this, and that I will have to learn to recognize myself again. And I am afraid he will want to do something, and I will not say no, and I am afraid that if this turns out poorly, it will break me.”

It's all spilling out. 

“They cut me apart, Rabbit. They tore out half of what Father made me and replaced it with their weapons of hatred and war that didn't even work. What if Peter finds something broken? What if I’m strapped there and he just keeps trying to fix something I didn’t ask, and I don't tell him to stop? I am not broken, Rabbit, I don’t need to be fixed, I don’t want him to fix me, I want him to put me how I was.”

She closes any distance between them and hugs him. 

Pulls him into her. 

He crumples like foil.

“I want to be how I was, Rabbit,” he says again, and he’s shuddering with how quickly he’s turning his gears, titanium hot, turbine spinning, steam pouring from everywhere it can.

Which is not nearly enough places, she’s learned. 

(Smoke is also rising from where his tesla coil sits beneath his shirt, which might be a bit singed.)

“I don’t want him to break me.” The way his voice doubles, shudders, breaks her, though, and she brings him closer.

He doesn’t even try to pull away. 

“I won’t let him.” She holds him. “Spine, I won’t let him. I promise.”

He doesn’t say anything else. Not for a long while. 

She walks him back to the hall of wires. 

Brings him more water to replace what he’s boiled away. 

Makes sure he’s resting. That he’s okay enough. That he’s not going to run out of water. That he’s alright.

Or as close to alright he can be right now. 

She has to talk to Peter. 

She’s had to talk to a lot of those, hasn’t she?

Chapter Text

So! 

So.

So.

Rabbit has got to talk to Pete about The Spine. She has to. 

Rabbit knows The Spine. She would like to think she knows The Spine best. Out of everyone.

She knows him the best. In fact, she knew him first. She saw him open his eyes. Saw him take his first still-creaking glimpses of Pappy’s workshop. Saw him stutter through his first thoughts. 

She knew him then, back when he didn’t know anything, she didn’t know anything then, either, but she knew more than him. Knew what tools were, who Delilah Morreo was, how they were made for her, what they were, everything . 

Sure, Pappy explained it well enough, but Rabbit was like him. And it's easier to explain how to be a metal man when you’re already one. 

Rabbit knows him best. 

Rabbit knew him first. 

Rabbit knows him best. Pete doesn't. 

And she has to talk to Pete about him. The actual him. And not the one he pretends he is. Because he will not EVER do that himself. 

Six isn’t bad, really. He’s smart. Quick. Rabbit likes Six, she does. He has wits to him! And other than the whole uh, super exploding off his face, he's never done much of a thing wrong, really! 

Thouuuugh, to be fair to him, Four got Space Exploded, and became a whole other thing, and she herself was kinda used to vaporize Two, which she does not want to think about, but maybe it's like— like great-grandfather like son? Genetic predisposition for being vaporized? In ANY CASE, losing a face isn't even the worst explosion one of her Peters have gotten into.

Anyway.

ANYWAY.

Six is a real good kid. 

Six probably gets it, too, really, the whole…. face everything. Not having the right face. Given he uhhhh got his smeared like butter on hot pavement in a parking lot of seagulls.

But then again. She thought Five was good at it all too, and then he signed that deal with Pepsi, so…

Well. Okay. Six isn’t Five. That’s unfair. Even so. But even if Six is— Fine.

Five realized what he did anyway, even if he hasn’t quite been able to fix it. He’s tried. But The Jon’s systems are weird and they can always synthesize pretty much the exact chemical makeup of diet pepsi, or get Hatchworth to get some, anyway, but it’s—

It still wasn’t great y'know??

Six is fine. But Six doesn’t know The Spine like she does. (No one knows The Spine like she does.) And if he's gonna be putting a whole new face, new shoulders, new neck AND new ventilation system into him, there's some things Rabbit really needs Six to know first.

Non-negotiable terms. Or something. Because it's not like The Spine will tell them to Pete himself.

The Spine. Advocating for himself in the robotics lab. Rabbit does not think that’ll happen. Nope. Not one bit.

So she has to talk to Pete. Because The Spine won’t talk to Pete. And Pete needs to know.  

Because if Pete's going to be making new body parts to put onto her brother, he needs to know what exactly he's doing to her brother.

She finds Peter in his office, on the phone with an intern, typing furiously into a document. She swings around the corner and over his desk. “Heya, P-P-P-Petesey,”

“Oh- Rabbit,” he sits up, sharply, spins on his chair to see her, muting his phone, “Lovely you're in, not so lovely a time, I’m very quite busy, right now-”

Oh. Hm. No. She’ll be talking. Right now, actually. 

“Nope,” She plonks her arms across his desk. Covering what he’s looking at. 

Peter sighs loudly, gesturing at the phone repeatedly. 

“Rabbit-”

“Pete, I’ve really gotta talk to you,” she says, turns her head to look at him, and- hm.

He's annoyed.

Shoulders all scrunched, head tilted, annoyed. 

I mean, sure, she interrupted him, but this is important!

She’s not going to let him make her go. Not right now. Not for this. Peter stares at her. She tilts her head. 

Sure. Maybe she destroyed his work station the other day. But that's whatever.

“It's about The Spine,” she adds. 

“Oh- Uh, yeah, I found the photos you put down here. They will be very helpful in designing a prototype.” He drums his fingers on the desk, “Now, um, Rabbit, this is a very important call, will you please-”

“It's not that,” she leans forward. Closer to him.

Watches, as Peter pauses, watches him as he breathes in, then out.

“...Right. What then, Rabbit?” He wants to get this over with. 

For some reason, that irks her. Three would do that, sometimes, when she’d go talk to him. Say exactly what he could to make her leave the fastest, go bother someone else. Two never did. Two would listen. She killed Two. And Three hated her after.

Three was on his own time. Giving any extra away to them when he didn’t plan for it bothered him. Giving her any of it wasn't something he did after 1950.

She hates being dismissed.

Six doesn't get to want that right now. 

Not for this. 

Not for when she’s finally got The Spine to actually DO something for himself. Something that’ll make him happier. 

She doesn’t want to wait for him to be done. She’s spent most of her life waiting already. Waiting for things to get better. Waiting to stop hating how she looked. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting to be heard.

Waiting.

She is done waiting. 

(Although, in retrospect, what she does next miiiight have been a little teensy tiny overreaction)

She reaches over, grabs the phone out of his hand, and smashes it into the floor so it cracks to pieces. Hopefully. Maybe. 

Her fingers don’t work on touch screens anyway. Not like she could have hung it up. 

Peter recoils back, tense, as he looks down at where it fell. 

“Rabbit,” It's a little incredulous, “Why?” 

“Pete.” 

She is so tired of waiting.

“Just tell me then, I'm busy, Rabbit. I can't chat,” he reaches down for the phone. “I have meetings, and business, and invoices, and timesheets to confirm, Please just tell me so I can get back to-”

She kicks the phone across the floor. 

“I would like you to listen t-t–t-to me, Pete,” 

Maybe it's something in the way she says it, or maybe he thinks it'll make her leave faster, but he goes quiet.

Meets her face.

She regards him. 

He takes a breath, smooths back his hair, before he leans over his knees. 

“Alright. Alright. Fine. Sure. If it's this important.”

He stares at her through his mask. 

Steam vents from her shoulders. 

“So The Spine's scared because he’s worried you’ll break him more.” She watches him, She needs to make sure he hears her, needs to make sure he listens. 

Three didn’t listen. Three was too busy falling apart to listen to anyone. He’s acting a bit like Three,

This is important. 

He has to listen. 

This is important.

He goes still, as she says it, shoulders freezing as he processes. 

So quiet she can hear the way he winces, under his breath, beneath his mask, before he breathes in, deliberate, and shakes out his hands. 

“Alright. Shoot.” He leans over his knees, listening. Looking at her. “What do you mean by that, Rabbit?”

He’s seeing her now. 

“Petesy, I like you, I do,” Rabbit leans over his desk, “You’re really really good at the whole fixing us thing! But The Spine— y’see, Pete, he’s really REALLY bad at sayin’ no. And saying stop is somethin’ I don't think he would even do, even if he was about he was about to break,”

She keeps her photoreceptors directly at his mask, as she leans towards him.

“And right now, Petes, he’s worried that when you fix him it’ll be worse than now, and Pete? It's pretty bad right now. And I'm only telling you all this because you finished me, right? You finished me.”

He’s the first Peter to ever entertain it. Much less do it.

“You actually fixed me. Which— that's a first, Pete. Your great great uncle was the one who messed The Spine up, or sent him to be, and your pappy messed The Jon up, Your grandpappy hardly got the chance to do anything, and before that it was all— Pete, you’re good at this, and you finished me. The Spine’s been broken for a couple years longer than he hasn’t been, and he’s afraid it’ll get worse. That you’ll break him.”

She’s very close to Pete’s face, now.

“So you’ve gotta promise me you won’t make him worse.” 

“Oh.” Says Peter. The word falls heavy. His fingers curl into his pants. 

He takes a sharp breath in.

Rabbit just keeps staring at him.

The Spine has always been so convinced he has to protect them all. It's Rabbit’s turn to protect him.  

It's her turn to fight for him. 

He’s done so much for her since forever.

It's time for her to do this for him. 

“So,” She continues, “You’ve gotta p-p-p-promise me you won’t break him.”

“Yeah- Okay, Rabbit,” says Peter, after, if she had to guess, five whole seconds of him just staring at her. “Of course, I want- I won’t make him worse. You know I’m going to make sure he agrees to what I’m doing. And if he doesn’t, I can put it right back to how it was before I did anything. He’ll like it.”

That's all good and all. 

But that's not what she asked. 

“Pete. You’ve gotta promise m-m-m-me it’ll be better this time.”

“I’m going to have him review all my diagrams first, just like we did with your face, Rabbit, and we’ll do the prototype for a few days, or weeks , even, and any feedback he gives me I’ll tweak for the final one. If he’s not happy, I’m not. And if it's worse, we’ll go back to before.”

That's still not what she asked. 

Peter needs to not hurt him. 

“Pete. I said promise me.”

“I-” His knuckles curl into his legs, he’s breathless, nearly, nervous, “I promise, Rabbit, if The Spine isn’t happy with it, I won’t-”

She brings her hand down on the desk. Hard. He tenses.

“That you won’t hurt him, Pete.”

“Rabbit, sometimes working is uncomfortable for you all-”

Uncomfortable? That's not what she asked. 

Uncomfortable is sitting there staring at the wall while hands switch out old oil. Uncomfortable is a worker fixing stuck joints. Uncomfortable is being bored because your feet have been taken off for 20 minutes, and you can't walk yet. Uncomfortable is inconvenient.

“My brother was take-take-taken by the government and had parts of his body sawed off while he was awake, P-P-P-Peter.”

“Rabbit-”

“My little brother The Jon had his systems ripped out and changed to crystal pepsi without even havin’ it explained to him right. And now he’s stuck that way,”

“I-”

“Hatchy was locked in the vault for decades. Zero was left in the basement and we didn't even know he was there. Upgrade was so upset about war happening again and bein’ forced there she ran away.”

Steam is pouring from her faceplate, her neck, her vents. 

“And Peter, I had my voice ripped out by my father just for asking to be-be-be me. So promise me, Peter, that you’re not going to hurt him.”

Her hand on her right arm folds in, and out folds her buzzsaw.

Sure, it's corroded, and it's certainly far from shining like it was 100 years ago. The gears responsible for making it turn fast have long gotten slow, and stuck, and she hasn’t exactly been chomping at the bit to get it fixed. But the edges are still very sharp.

She’d told The Spine she got rid of all her weapons when The Jon, Upgrade and Hatchworth did.

She didn’t. 

She was built as a machine of war. She still is one. Will still be one. If she needs to be. If the rare occasion calls. 

“Oh.” Peter inches his chair backwards. “Oh. Uh. Okay. Um. Okay. Yep. I promise. Rabbit. I promise I won’t hurt him. Or do anything he doesn’t want me to do. Or break him.”

“You finished me, Peter, that's why I'm lettin’ you know that he’s scared. He h-h-h-hatess when people know he's scared. He doesn't say No, or Stop, or anything. He’d let you. So you'd better be careful not to hurt him.”

“I promise I will be.” Peter laughs shakily, compulsively, nervous. “He's in good hands, Rabbit, I promise I won't hurt him.”

She stays there a few moments more. 

Judging.

Does he mean that, is the question. 

He did finish her.

Peter did finish her. 

He can certainly fix The Spine. He didn’t hurt her. Peter won’t hurt him.

“Good,” She agrees, pulls away, straightens up. Makes her face do something like a smile. She used to do that all the time, before. Her hand creaks back out, as she folds away her buzzsaw. “That's just what I wanted to hear, Pete,”

He stares at her.

“Don’t fuck this up!” Her head glitches to the side, her hand spasms as long unused gears catch, folding up her saw. “Because I am really tired of seeing my siblings be broken, Pete, and The Spine has been through enough botched upgrades.”

“I wouldn’t do anything like that. I promise.” He holds his palms up, “I just want to help him.”

“Right,” She takes a step back, reaches up, rights her head on her shoulders, snaps it back into position, “Get back to it then, Pete! Chop chop. Phone calls and whatever. And if you hurt him, you will regret it.”

With that, she turns, leaves.

Six finished her.

He knows all about the horribleness that is having not the right face.

He can help The Spine.

She just needs to make sure he doesn't hurt him more in the process.

Six is a good kid.

A smart one. A kind one. 

She’s not letting this cycle keep going. 

She’s done waiting for things to get better. The future is here. And it’s theirs to make the best of. 

Chapter Text

The Spine is tired. 

Well, no. Not really. He is a robot. Robots cannot get tired. That is a human affliction.

But… Well.

He is the sort of exhausted that only comes with ‘churned through most of the water his boiler twice, then had Rabbit worry after him for an extended period of time.’

The first is mechanically exhausting. The heat generated alone is uncomfortable. The second is existentially exhausting, because worrying Rabbit is never just done and over. 

She cares. She cares more than is good for her. And he hates when she worries about him.

She does not need to.

He is fine.

Regardless. She left him with enough water that he’s still running on mostly full. Which is good. He had denied he needed it earlier. But Rabbit had been right, and he had boiled through most of his reserves. 

His heat sink fans still haven't entirely cooled.

He’s up in the wires, now, though, secluded, listening to music, trying to forget about it all, trying to just be normal when the doors whoosh open. 

“Why do you even have a door?” Asks none other than Peter Walter the Sixth from below him, “I thought I got rid of all those.”

He’s come for the door.

Goddamnit. 

The Spine peers down at him, meets the keyhole gaze of Peter, who is looking directly up at him.

“Hey uh, The Spine? If it's not a good time I get it, but I sorta want to talk to you.”

Is it a good time?

No. Not really. He only just managed to get his turbine and gear shaft to stop spinning too fast. And he is still overheating.

But who is he to say no to a conversation? It’s probably important.

So, of course, he lowers himself down from The Wires, to stand in front of Peter.

Peter A. Walter the Sixth, who looks up at him, a guilty sort of air to him. 

Hm.

“You can sit.” The Spine gestures to the couch. It's tucked against the wall, old, unused. “Apologies about the uh— dust.”

No one particularly uses his couch. He’s usually the one dragged off onto an adventure, rather than people coming here to talk adventure with him. In here. There is rarely an adventure in this room. 

Unless you count trying to talk with Qwerty as an adventure. Which sure. Then there have been plenty of those in here.

Regardless.

Peter takes a seat, rests his cane against the arm rest. It immediately slips, falls, and Peter sighs. Reaches down to snag it, as The Spine sits beside him.

This is…distinctly awkward.

“What brings you in, Peter?” He asks.

Peter takes a long breath, which is. Hm.

Not that great of a sign.

“Rabbit. Uh. Rabbit and me had a bit of a chat earlier, about you.”

Oh. How Joyous. The Spine looks up, pinches his nose.

“Alright. Peter, whatever she told you, I assure you is either meaningless gossip or significantly overblown.”

“She told me you were— ah, you had nerves about what we’ve been working on.”

Oh.

What a joy, Rabbit. Thank you. Thank you for airing that directly to Peter.

“More uh, well, she told me you were scared I’d break you. Which— Not that I blame you! Given, uh, the track of things, before! But I want to have a chat about that?”

Embarrassment is horrible.

Embarrassment mixed with mortification is worse, he finds. Especially because he, very explicitly, did not want Peter to know that.

He drops his head into his hands, and sighs.

“What did she tell you?”

“Nothing— nothing that bad, just that you were worried, about uh— me breaking you, happening, or uh, things turning out worse than they are now?”

So she told him everything.

“I am aware of how irrational it is, Peter. You do not need to reassure me of my own faulty thoughts.”

“No— no, I mean, it's not. Irrational! It’s not irrational, I mean, heck, Spine, your entire face is— they broke you? Your entire jaw joint is degrees out of alignment. Bent, practically. I— that’s not surface level damage, I was looking through um, Uncle Peter the Third’s notes, on when you came back— he called that minor. Can’t imagine what that was like, right? It’s not irrational. Especially with how uh— dismissive, that is?”

Oh.

Well. It was minor damage in the scheme of things. Compared to Vietnam, he supposes. 

Awful nonetheless that Six knows all this.

“I am fine, Peter.”

“I mean— no, you’re not, Spine. That’s not fine. That’s messed up.”

“It was a long time ago.” He does not want to talk about this. Talking about this involves far too much thinking about this. Which he does not want to do.

“And? It’s still messed up. And you uh, well, you know you can say no to me, right?” Peter drums his fingers along his knee, hunched forward, “If you don’t like, or want any of this? That’s fine! A-Okay! I won’t be upset, I’d be ecstatic you told me,”

“Peter, you do not need to explain this. I am well aware.”

“I know,  I know, it’s just— You know, you were on another planet, Spine, when I was working on you, the other day,”

Was he?

“I don't want you hurt, Spine, is all.”

He thought he was rather fine and normal when Peter was taking his head off. Was he that obvious?

Shit. 

“I am a robot. I cannot be hurt.” He says, and that is the exact wrong thing to say, he knows it before he even finishes the words, because Six freezes, turns to him, incredulous. 

“No,” Peter just looks at him, “I know better than that.”

“Physically.” The Spine corrects, but that’s not true either.

“I’m not talking about physically. And that’s— Spine, I know you all feel pain, or something close enough to it. And that doesn’t make them, uh, breaking you fine?”

“Peter,” He hates how he sounds, as he talks, exhausted, he can’t even muster a proper lie. “Rabbit thinks a lot of things about me, and not all of them are true. Please disregard whatever she said. I will be fine.”

Peter doesn’t say anything for a few moments, and The Spine thinks he may leave, and leave him alone to a whole new crisis, but then Peter reaches over, and takes his shoulder.

“Y’know, The Spine, Making Rabbit’s face is my favorite thing I’ve ever done. Maybe not the most impressive! But my favorite. At least recently.”

“...What?”

“Rabbit’s face. She was so delighted to work with me on it, Spine. I don't think I ever saw her happier than when I finished installing it. My whole life I’ve known you all— and I’d never seen her so happy as when she looked in the mirror after,”

Peter’s hand pats him. Twice. 

It is patronizing. He is perhaps going to deactivate forever. 

“Making her herself was something I was stupidly worried about, Spine? I mean, heck, who am I to make such big changes for you all? You’re all four times older than me! But she’s never been happier. She says I finished her, that’s— That’s a lot, you know?”

Peter pulls his hand back, then, slowly, after a moment’s deliberation, reaches up behind his head.

Oh.

“The concept of finishing her, I don’t think I finished her, but if that’s what she wants, then I’m happy to have done it, right? But— It was nice, Spine,”

“Peter you really don’t need to do that—”

Peter unbuckles the strap around the back of his head. Pulls off his mask. The Spine swallows anything he might’ve said. 

He’s only seen Peter without it a few times, since his accident.

Peter doesn’t have much of anything recognizable left under it. Grayed skin, twisted features, flattened and stiff after all of the surgeries he’s had since trying to put anything right. His cheekbones are sunken in, his nose fused sideways with his cheek. 

The Spine remembers when he visited Pete in the hospital after. The bloody smeared features left of his face. 

The Spine hadn’t been able to stay long, reminded of worse times.

(He remembers what was left of Two and Guy vividly. When he had arrived to where Rabbit had been held, it had been like a nightmare crawled to earth. The fractalized spirals of flesh left on the floor, the way Rabbit was all but seizing in panic next to Three, who was still miraculously breathing. How The Spine had had to pull her away, pull her against him as everything in her screamed, every gear and piston in her screeched. Three had been rushed to the hospital, Two and Guy had been—)

(Well, the funerals had been with urns. Closed casket wasn’t an option when there wasn’t enough left for a casket to begin with.)

(Six had gotten off very easy, comparatively)

Peter looks at him, mouth a thin line, serious, expressive, as he gestures up at himself. 

“I don’t have a face, Spine. I never will again. That ship has sailed. Gone.”

“Peter—”

“So— I get it, Spine, I do. The not looking right. If someone did all this,” He gestures up at himself, the scar tissue, the smeared skin, “To me on purpose? I think I would have lost it! Rabbit frankly has the patience of a saint, bottling that up for so long,”

Peter holds up the mask, turns it around so the keyhole faces him. Looks at it with his one functional eye. He still had both of his, immediately after the accident, but his left eye hadn’t stayed viable for very long; gone necrotic as his right eye warped, shifted inward, as his bones set and his skin healed. 

Peter, out of every engineer to work on him, would understand faces best.

“That's what happened to you too, right? They took your face and replaced it with one you hate. It's awful, Spine, that this would happen to anyone on purpose.”

“It's not the same, Peter,” He tries but— Well. It is. Isn’t it? “Or— at the very least, I can handle it. I have, for a significant amount of time longer than you have existed. It is just— Unpleasant.”

“It is the same, though!” Peter sets his mask aside, turns to him fully, “I ruined my own face, Spine. And that’s awful enough. They ruined yours. I can’t make my face how it was.” 

“Whatever Rabbit has told you that has you so concerned with me, please disregard it.”

“I can’t make my face how it was.” He repeats, “But I can help you put yours how it was, The Spine. You phrased it as a restoration project. Specifically. I like that word for it. Restoration. It’s a good word. If I’m making you a new face, I want it to be yours. I want you to be happy with it, and not— not just put a new one you hate on. I’d want it to fit you. So you don’t have the— this,”

Again, Peter gestures at his own face.

“The all this that comes with things that aren’t right.”

“Peter, I'm fine.” It's hollow at this point, and they both know it.

“But you could be better! You will be. If you want me to help.”

He doesn’t want to talk about this.

It seems he will anyway.

 “…Peter. Yes. I am happy with our arrangement that we have right now. Having a prototype to work out any kinks and issues that arise by installing a new piece of machinery onto me is more than enough reassurance to make me more than comfortable to allow you to work on me. Any issues will be worked out, and I will not be left half-functional again.”

“That’s good and all. But—That’s not even what I’m worried about. How can I make you feel safe when I'm installing it?”

“I will be fine.”

“I want safe, not fine, Spine.”

Safe.

Well. That won’t ever happen. He never so much as felt safe even with his own father working on him, not after he tore out Rabbit’s voice. Ripped out her core. Broke her and himself in the process. 

There was always that worry, after.

That if he did something wrong during it would happen to him, too.

“I will weather, Peter.”

“Well, Rabbit being there would help, be.. good? A lot of people have others go with them to the doctor’s. That’s— this is the same, right? Auntie Wanda always goes with Norman, to make sure they aren’t rude to him.”

Peter looks so genuine, as he talks, eye wide, leaning forward.

The Spine doesn't know what to say. 

“I know that, Peter, I— Yes, I would like her to be there, but that’s besides the point, she would insist,. This is her scheme, regardless,”

“Would it make you feel safer though? With me working? To have her?”

“Yes. Fine.” He hates this. Admitting he doesn’t feel safe— that is— awful.

This is awful.

Everything about Peter knowing is awful.

“You can tell me to stop, you know, or have Rabbit to tell me, even! And I would! Immediately.”

The Spine leans over his knees.

Folds over his hands.

This is an awful conversation. He would be better off not having it. 

He tried to say stop before, years ago. Years and years ago. It never ended well. Not with Three, not with the Government. No one listened. There is little point in voicing what never will be heard, and will only get you burnt.

And he wants the outcome of this regardless. Even it is a bit uncomfortable getting there. 

“I don’t know, Peter.

“…I’m sorry that this happened, y'know? And that it’s been so long, without anyone undoing it.”

“If I had wanted myself restored, I could have asked your father at any point before you. Or you, at any point for the last several years. Rabbit has gotten it into her head that I need to do it now. And it will be nice, but it is not urgent.”

“...Would you have wanted this, if Rabbit didn’t push you too? We can uh, forget this happened, if you don’t want me to.”

“I want to, Peter,” He does. He… very much does. “I would like my face to be mine again.”

Being himself again is very appealing. But… Well, the rest of it isn’t.

“You know, The Spine, if I hadn’t just made Rabbit’s face, I’d have been a lot more hesitant about this. Faces are a lot of pressure. But I know what I’m doing. Mechanically I'm not even worried! It’s easy enough to replace external plates, and Rabbit’s face went perfectly. I’d just want to make sure that when I put it on you, I’m doing it in a way that is the least bad,”

He doesn’t know what to say.

“I’m a robot, Peter, it will at most be uncomfortable. I do not feel pain like you.” The Spine can’t look at him.

He knows it’s flimsy. Knows it’s nothing. Knows it’s a lie.

Admitting that he’s scared somewhat shitless of being broken again is impossible.

“Spine. Please.” Peter’s voice is soft, almost pleading. 

“…I will think about what would make it more tolerable.”

“Thank you.”

He wishes he had proper ventilation already. He’s overheating again. Steam pouring from his seams.

He’d just gotten that under control before Peter came in.

And here he is all over again.

“Spine?”

“Yes Peter?”

“What do you want in a face?”

What does he want? Expressive capabilities? Aesthetic Contrast like Rabbit? Indestructibility? Something he can recognize?

“….I would like adequate ventilation.”

“That's a given, Spine,” He feels Peter’s hand land on his shoulder again. This is miserable. He’s surely far too hot for it to be comfortable. He knows it.

Peter keeps his hand there anyway.

“Do you want the exact same face as you did before? How my great great grandpappy made you look?”

“….I think so, Peter.”

“We can start with that for the prototype then, and make any iterations from there. Think about it, Spine, what makes your face yours. I want it to fit you, not just be a piece of machinery you can move.”

Peter Three would have laughed at that.

Even before 1950 it was all function with him. Function and perfection. And Two was often too busy with his children and experiments on portals and rifts to interfere, much, left most of the practical engineering of them to his brother. Two was the politician of the two, the accountant, at least until—

When they discovered Rabbit was missing, he had all but lost his mind trying to find her. 

Then he never came home. And everything fell apart rather rapidly from there, with the war, and Three’s grief, debts racking up, orders unfilled, his deal with the Beciles, and—

And it was so very long ago, now. 

“Rabbit loves how expressive her face is, the way I shaped her cheeks,” Peter continues, like this is a typical conversation to have, like The Spine's opinion is a commonplace thing to consider, “She’s fond of the way she can color the lips however she wants. I did all that because that’s what she wanted. She gave me ideas. I delivered them the best I could.”

He doesn’t want anything fancy.

He just wants to look like himself.

He sits up, looks at Peter, silent, for a long few moments.

Six is genuine. 

“You were very good to her, Peter.”

“It was my pleasure. But it’s— I really do get it. Not having a face that’s right. Losing your face. It’s awful. And I— I just want to make sure that doesn't happen to you again, y’know?”

There is oil in his eyes. He doesn’t know how to do this.

He never has, really. 

He’s a machine of war masquerading as a musician. He’s a weapon given the ability to sing. He looks away, looks up, to keep oil from dripping down his cheeks.

Before her new face, when Rabbit cried, it was often hard to tell if she was trying to hide it, the oil blended similar enough in shade to corroded copper that it was easy enough to hide. 

It has never been easy for him to hide tears. 

“..Thank you, Peter.”

“You don't gotta. You deserve the basic grace of having a face that’s yours, Spine,” Peter pats his shoulder, then pulls back, reaching for his mask. “You haven’t in years, that’s messed up,”

He brings the mask up to his face, rebuckles the strap.

“If you think of anything else, Spine, that could make this better, please tell me?”

“..I will, Pete.” He offers, quiet.

He’s not sure if he will.

But he might.

Peter seems satisfied with that, at least. He reaches for his cane, levers himself up. “I’ll be working on designing that prototype in my lab. If you need anything about this, tell me.”

“Of course.”

He’ll think about it, at the very least.

He’s so tired.

Perhaps robots can get tired.

“…But also, Spine,” Peter turns towards him, leans on his cane, tilts his head, “Seriously, when did you get a door?”

The Spine barks out a laugh, crackly, as he tries to keep the oil from pouring down his cheeks.

“That is a secret, Pete,”

“Well, we’ll see how long I leave it. Who knows. Someone might confuse it for me. We can’t have that, now, can we?”

Peter walks out then, and the door swooshes shut behind him.

The Spine stares at it, for a long few minutes. He would perhaps rather never talk to anyone ever again.

But..

Well.

Perhaps he’ll think more about what will make it less awful. If Six listens, it probably wouldn't be a waste of time, regardless.

He does feel a bit better about this.

Maybe.

Maybe somewhat a little.

Chapter Text

The Spine is not human. 

This is rather a given. 

This has, in fact, always been a given. He is made of the earth in a much more literal manner than most things that exist, and are living. He is molded from metal mined up by humans, hewn and worked into delicate shapes that fit together like a puzzle. 

He is entirely intentional. He is entirely artificial. 

Constructed. Created. Owned and augmented. A work in progress by some measures, a completed thing by others. 

He is not a human.

Humans are spontaneous. Undecided. Forever changing. Touched constantly by time and air and death and sunlight. 

He is so aware of the difference it all but burns. A jealous fire to be seen as real lit inside him the moment he realized most will only ever view him as a particularly advanced wind-up toy. 

And as much as he would love to, he can never understand them. He will never know what adrenaline in battle is like, nor what a kind touch is like against skin, rather than haptical sensors, electric fields. 

He will never know.

Though… as he has learned, humans cannot understand him, either. They can memorize his workings, his wirings, his pieces, but they do not understand it deeper than intellectually. Artificial discomfort. Feelings of metal. Stark and robotic. Humans cannot understand it. 

They especially cannot understand the simple and succinct horror of being the sum of, but not the finale, of all your parts.

The Spine is standing in Six’s robotics laboratory. Which used to be Five’s, which was briefly Wanda’s, which used to be Three’s, which used to be Two and Three’s, which was once upon a time his own father’s. 

He is standing in the Walter Robotics robotics laboratory. He is staring at his own face. 

Having new pieces of you machined and crafted is something humans, by and large, cannot understand. Standing there looking down at new parts, new pieces of you, laid out on a table arranged for pre-installation viewing is particularly harrowing.

Especially when you have all but forgotten your own face

Perhaps some humans can understand it. Wanda had her hip replaced with a titanium one several years ago after a fall. (She had chosen titanium of the metal options because she knew it would make him laugh. It did.)

Perhaps if you took out her new hip, and had her look at it, it would be harrowing.

But then again, perhaps not. 

All that said, Peter has finished his face. Or well— the prototype of his new face.

It's sooner than The Spine expected. Only a few weeks out from his initial request. Fast, especially for the machining and cutting of new metal. He supposes having blueprints for it does assist in speed but—

It is very timely. 

Peter is dedicated. The Spine knows this, of course, but—

But he is worried. He is worried, and he hates that he is worried. He had assumed he had perhaps a few more weeks to settle himself, once again, into the concept of relearning his reflection.

It appears not.

Seeing his own face attached to a mock up of his head is not an experience humans typically have. Certainly they might commission marble busts or wax replicas, but that is not their face, and they certainly will not be wearing it shortly. 

“So uh—” Starts Peter, buzzing beside him with his morning coffee, “Do you think it looks right, The Spine? I followed the old blueprints and photos best I could, but I'm not quite sure I have the um, the plates right, on the top of your head? I mirrored Rabbit’s design, the uh, folding aspects. You don’t have antenna like her, but this’ll allow access to the internals of your head a lot easier, just like hers does, and I figured it was better than the flat metal from before?”

Peter rambles. 

The Spine is only half listening. 

Because it looks like him. 

Actually like him. Like he is supposed to look. He does not look that way right now. 

“The machining is a bit rough, along the corners,” The Spine notes, reaching out, adjusting the mock-up’s jaw up and down. 

His will move like that shortly. Slightly more range of motion, significantly less humanoid. But hopefully significantly less uncanny valley.  

“Oh— yes! It's a prototype, It’ll— I figured you would rather have the blocks of it, to test. The second version will be a lot cleaner, of course, and lot more intricate! I wanted to make sure everything was compatible before spending months on a perfect one,”

That makes sense.

He hasn’t seen himself in decades.

And there he is. On what amounts to a mannequin of his metal skull. Ready for installation.

“We’ll be installing it this evening?” He asks, breaks his receptors from it, turning to Peter. Who nods, throws a thumbs up. 

“Yes! Unless tomorrow works better?” 

“Evening is fine,” He says, and all this is—

It is a lot of change, very quickly.

It seems like it will be a good one, though. 

….

The Spine has been antsy. Rabbit is beside him, poking him with her screwdriver. 

“....And if anythin’ goes wrong,” she continues, as she has been for most of the last few hours, the same reassurances, but it isn’t like he doesn’t need them, “I’ll steal Pete’s tools and explode them, or I’ll burn down the workshop, or I’ll get GG to bite his ankles, or—”

“I would advise against burning down our house, Rabbit,” 

She laughs, confident, like he doesn’t have a harrowing and likely horrible evening ahead of him. She drapes her arm around his shoulders. 

“A-a-and if anything goes wrong I’ll stop it , and you’ll be fine, Spine! And it’ll stop being wrong, and you’ll be fine!”

He sighs and lets his head drop into his hands.

“I know, Rabbit.”

He’s worried. Without her The Spine would have perhaps overheated his way into a shut-down by now.

“You’re scarin’ yourself, The Spine! It's no big d-d-d-deal, Pete has to switch out The Jon’s vent pipes every few months, so he’s good at that, and he put on my face so fast!”

It's fine. He knows it's fine. 

It's just that anticipation is a horrifying thing. Crawling and ripping and eating away at him until it is all his processors are processing, and all his ram is memorizing. You would think he’s running programs on a solid state drive with how stuck on it he is. 

He’ll be fine.

“A-a-a-and Pete’s gonna do a perfect job, Spine, and you’ll stop overheating, and it’ll be great,”

There is oil in his eyes. His turbine is spinning far too loud. 

The last time he had major changes to his chassis was 1955.

Rabbit’s arm around his shoulders tightens, as she pulls him closer to her. 

He lets her, lets himself clunk sideways against her frame. Turns his head so she can’t see the way oil is pooling against his eyes. 

“You're gonna be perfect, Spine, and it’ll all be a lot better, you’ll feel a lot better, I did, and you will too.”

“..Alright, Rabbit,” He dislikes how his voice breaks, as he says it.

“You’re not even gonna know how much b-b-b-better you’ll feel until you do, Spine,”

She wraps her other arm around him, holds him.

For once he lets her. Too nervous to do anything but. 

She’ll be with him, at least. 

And from what he hears through the Wi-Fi, she probably would stop Pete any way possible, if he asked her to. 

Such as with her buzzsaw she implied she got rid of decades ago.

…

Time rolls forward. Internal clock clicking onward. The Spine puts himself together. Lets Rabbit wipe the oil from his eyes, fix his hat, and tell him about how great all this will be.

It is ridiculous sitting there as she wipes off his face, chattering on about how better his new one will be.

It is ridiculous. It calms him down regardless. 

Peter pages them down to the lab, and they head down.

Peter peers at them through the door frame, as they approach, waving enthusiastically.

“There you two are!” he greets, swings his arm around The Spine as they walk in, cane in his other hand, “I have everything set up already, so it shouldn’t take all too long, I’ve been reviewing your old ventilation system all week when I wasn’t cutting metal, this shouldn’t take too long,”

It really isn’t that awful, getting set up to go onto the table. Unbuttoning his vest, pulling off his shirt, laying down. 

Maintenance and repair work is common enough. He’s used to it. 

Usually he doesn’t need to access things in his back, though. Most maintenance can be done from the front, laying back in a chair. 

This is not usual maintenance. 

 Peter positions him prone on his stomach, arms folded at his sides.  

Peter needs access to his smokestacks, and to the back of his boiler. Remaining upright he is liable to fall, so prone he will be. 

What an odd thing to say in this day and age. Access his smokestacks. He has not had anything remotely comparable to them in so long.

Nonetheless. He will weather.

Rabbit takes his hand though, as she perches herself on the end of the work table beside him. 

He would have backed out of this whole thing if Rabbit wasn’t here with him. 

Well, no, probably not. That’s a dramatic oversimplification. He has realized needs this. He has needed this. His operating systems have been in the yellow for decades. The stress of it on his mechanics has compounded. But it would not have helped things if she were not here.

If Rabbit were not here, he would be significantly less internally calm. 

“So Spine,” Peter starts, “I figured we’d get the ventilation done with, first, because I need to rig it to your vents in your new face anyway, is that alright?”

He’s the expert on it. And also explained this this morning. And yesterday. 

“If you think it's best, Pete.” He agrees.

“Yeah, this is the best way. Anyway— you should probably run a lot better, once you’re all finished up with this. I was crunching the numbers the other day, with all your diagrams, with uh, your design, and seriously, Spine, I don’t know how you keep going on without any proper ventilation, I mean, sheesh, sure, they wanted to send you on spy missions, but the heat levels alone are bad. I know my Dad got kind of hands off, after uh, the Pepsi stuff, but he should’ve put something together about this, because you are not built to deal with this,”

Peter rambles.

“And sure your fans sink heat, but not nearly enough to offset, it's a wonder you aren't breaking down more often. I guess my uh— great uncle, must have heat proofed you other ways, but still, you’ve really needed this. Annnnnyways,”

The Spine hears Peter’s drill click on, and that means his back is about to be unscrewed.

“Time to get all this off. Y’know, The Spine, I was thinking it’s a good thing your fans can un-extrude, how else would you sit in chairs? Or in cars? Getting you all to shows is enough of a logistical nightmare, imagine if we couldn’t use typical vehicles, that’d suck. Or you’d have to lay down in the back seat, which, I mean, it wouldn't be illegal because you’re not legally a person, but still, unpleasant, limits space a lot. Anyway, I bring that up because I’ll need to take a few off temporarily for this, so that’ll suck, and—”

“Heya Pete?” Rabbit cuts in, “Didn't’ja say we were going to listen to music he likes? Because that’d help?”

“Oh shoot— yeah, we totally were, hey QWERTY can you play The Spine’s playlist? Thanks! ” 

He really should have thought of playing music during this himself. It gives him something to focus on, instead of only the tactile sensation of his screws being undone. Of coming apart. 

Rabbit suggested it. 

It makes time pass differently, if he can simply listen to music and pretend he is only laying down, and not being disassembled. Less like he is in a bad episode of some horror movie, being slowly taken apart.

It is easier that way. 

The music starts, and The Spine tries to relax, steam pours from the gaps in his plating, and he tries to stop thinking. 

Beside him, Rabbit hums along to the song. 

He is... Very glad she’s here. 

His back comes off in quite a few pieces. Two for each arm, so they can bend backwards. Several for his hips, and the main backing plates. 

Halfway through a song he hears Pete pull back, drawing him from his silence as he comes to a more conscious awareness. Running a quick diagnostic scan, it—

Well, he thought it had been a bit less time than it was. Pete’s mostly done taking him apart.  

Hm.

Maybe this is worse for him than he thought. 

Regardless, Rabbit’s playing with his fingers, folding the joints in and out. He turns his head to meet her gaze. She smiles down at him, a little, worried, nodding to Pete.

Ah. They may have been talking without him.

“Did you say something, Rabbit?” He asks. 

She informed him, several days ago now, that apparently when Peter was taking measurements he had stopped responding to them, at least from auditory input. Which has been nerve wracking to hear, but… Well. He would rather not pay attention to slowly being dissected regardless.

“N-n-no, not really, Spine, Peter was talking, though,”

“Alright,” He says, wishing the music had not stopped, that Peter would get this on with, so he can pretend this did not happen sooner. Above him, The Spine hears several fans kick on, pointed down at him. His internal temperature drops a few degrees, 

“So— The Spine, I was just turning up the overhead fans, lots of steam, in here, needed to get that running out faster, anyway, ” He hears Peter’s footsteps as he skitters back over.

He would turn to face him, but it is rather hard to look at someone whose head is several inches from your back, with their hands all inside you.

“As long as you’re listenin’ Good news! Figure I’ll tell you, for uh, transparency. This will be quicker than I thought, I knew they swapped out your boiler, in the 50s with a new uh, different, model, but you’re built similar to The Jon! At least— enough, y’know? Not the exact same model, but the same chimney pipe size, with the piping here,” he hears a small clink from inside his chest, Peter tapping around in him, “Which means I can use his extra parts, and do pretty much what he has going on, ventilation wise, but route to your neck instead of the vents on top his head, I’ve done his a thousand times now, and you’ll run a lot cooler,”

The Spine squeezes Rabbit’s hand. 

He’d maybe like to be powered off, honestly. Perhaps he would rather be off.

(But would that not be worse, to have to forget? To not know?)

“Before that, though! The Spine, I’ve gotta polish down the edge of this smokestack so that it won’t rip the clothes you wear, because it’ll be fully external now, and it's wicked sharp,”

“Alright.” He agrees verbally, because doing otherwise would require Rabbit to talk for him, which is mortifying. He does not say he would rather just be off, because he does not know if he actually wants that, or if he just wishes this were over already.

It’s a good thing to do, really. Buff down the sharp edges. He needs to not rip apart the collars of his shirts. He would look horrible on stage if that occurred. And it is sharp. He did cut Peter’s finger with it, which is horrible. It would certainly wreck his necklines. 

His shirts will need to be tailored regardless to allow for ventilation there, though. But they already are for his fans, so it should not be too much of a problem.

Then Peter turns on the grinder, brings it to his neck and The Spine’s train of thought derails entirely.

The Spine can hear it. The motor of the grinder. He feels it, nearly, as it cuts through the air close to him.

It whirrs. Loud and humming. Roaring, mechanical. Shrill and high pitched.

It’s right above his neck.

The sound only gets louder.

He is entirely certain, as he lays there, that it is a saw. 

Chapter Text

The Spine can hear it. The motor of the grinder. He feels it, nearly, as it cuts through the air close to him.

It whirrs. Loud and humming. Roaring, mechanical. Shrill and high pitched.

It’s right above his neck.

The sound only gets louder.

He is entirely certain, as he lays there, that it is a saw. 

…

In 1955, The Spine had been temporarily leased to the government for augmentation and retrofitting to the modern era. 

Ever since Two passed, Peter A. Walter III had struggled to keep the company afloat. Three did not complete several orders on time, and several others at all. The refunds given to those who commissioned them took much of their savings.

Mark had been trying to catch up on the backlog when he passed.

The backlog was not completed. More refunds were issued.

And they were, The Spine knew, broke.

Three strugged.

The Spine knew this. They all knew this by the way Three stood standoffish, by the way things were falling apart, by the way he complained about how much they cost to maintain, by everything about him.

Wanda had her own opinions on it all, as she tuned them up. It was a she could find energy to do, at a certain point.

No one else was going to work to keep them running. And she needed something to do with her hands. She needed some reason to get out of bed.

The Spine thought they’d all be better off with her running the business. But she was a grieving widow, according to Three, and was certainly in no state to control the money books. Even as he burnt everything Two had in his own grieving fits. 

Guy was dead, and so was her father, but despite the tears, Wanda was the only one down in the workshop fixing them. 

All that said. 

In 1955, the US government offered Peter A. Walter III a deal. They would retrofit one of his robots into a new and modern war machine, fit for the army in this modern year rather than the bygone one of yesteryear, and in return they would bail him out of his debts. 

Between the government’s bailout and Three’s deal with Ignatius Becile, the company seemed to be getting back on its feet. Or so The Spine thought. 

In February 1955, he was packed away into the back of a government truck, to be brought to a facility to make something modern of him.

At first it hadn’t been terrible. 

At first the government's technicians spoke to him something like a person. Dismissive, certainly, and like he could hardly think, certainly, but they explained at first. They explained where he was, what sort of upgrades they would be doing, and occasionally even introduced themselves to him and shook his hand. 

That stopped quickly. 

That stopped the moment he was reluctant to let them pry out his core to get a look at exactly how he really ticked.

They had entirely stopped telling him what they were doing by the time they sawed off his smokestacks. 

It had been horrific. He thinks, in the sort of faraway way he recalls most of what happened there. He had been clamped him face down against the table, vices screwed flat and tight against his frame, so many and so thoroughly he could not have moved even if he worked with everything in him.

He did not, of course, struggle, because he was not going to disobey orders. He has always been a solider. He has always listened to orders. 

The Spine knew, even then, it was about the principle of the matter. Restraining the killer robot. Protecting real US infantrymen from the horrible machine. Restraining the object so it could not malfunction and harm the real people working on it.

The real people. Because he is not one of those. 

The saw had made his entire body shudder, made his components rattle, made him feel like he was falling apart.

He had stopped being able to make sense of a lot of the haptical input, sawblade screaming, after only seconds.

Then of course, the blade snapped, the technician slipped forward, and then he couldn’t even beg them to stop anymore if he had wanted to, couldn’t make his body move the way he wanted, couldn’t think right.

Couldn’t do a single thing, as they hacked the rest of him off. 

…

The Spine needs Peter to stop. As the grinder touches his neck he knows, fully, entirely, that he needs Peter to stop . 

Sparks fly off him, metal grinds, the smaller engine screams, and he can't think. He can't think at all. He can't move, can't make himself pull away, what if it goes into his neck again? He thinks, what if it snaps, what if he breaks again?

His smokestacks were welded directly to his frame. It has to be ground down. This is the only way it can be removed. This is the only way to fix him. This is the only way to upgrade him. This is the only way to augment him. 

He needs it to stop nonetheless.

He can't make his voicebox respond, as he tries. 

He can't make his hands move, to signal stop. 

Wifi didn't exist in the 50s.

Listening to him when he said no didn't exist in the 50s.

He reaches out to Rabbit.

He needs this to stop.

…

…

Y’know, it's horrible, isn't it? Watching someone you love implode?

Rabbit's been watching people she loves implode for most of her life. 

Pappy, back when she was so young she didn't know anything, imploded after Miss Delilah Morreo’s death. Three got weird in the head after she killed Two, stopped making any sense. Mark crashed apart after Misses Judy died, and then he wrecked his car. She still thinks he might've done it on purpose. Four deconstructed in their graveyard before he left forever through that rift. She was standing behind him, while he clutched his head and screamed into his hands.

She knew four was never gonna come back when he left.

She’s seen a lotta people implode. 

The Spine, just, in general, has been slowly imploding for the last 60 years.

Rabbit learned, while she was watching Six machine the new metal for The Spine’s face, that titanium shavings are flammable. 

That kinda explains a lot, if ya think about it. 

Titanium is supposed to be corrosion resistant. It's lightweight and strong, or something. That's titanium. That’s The Spine. He’s been in his head about how he’s the most durable of them since he grasped the concept of it. But if you grind titanium it up super small, it's extremely flammable.

That makes sense for The Spine.

Like, metaphorically.

He’d probably burn up into nothing if you pressed him too hard.

He’s laying there still, as Peter works. His eyes are shut, his turbine spinning fast, and she’s holding his hand. 

Then he tells her to make it stop, just as sparks begin to jump from his neck. 

Rabbit will, in fact, make it stop.

She promised him she would.

Rabbit doesn’t hesitate, not for a microsecond as she jams her hand forward between Peter’s angle grinder and The Spine. Sparks fly, and Peter rears back, shouting as he turns it off, but she’s too busy crouching over The Spine to even look at him.

Metal can be remade. Hands can be fixed. 

You can’t unbreak someone. 

You can't unsuffer, really. You can’t get back time spent breaking.

She’s learned that over the years. 

You can fix a lot of things. You can’t unbreak someone’s heart.   

She asks— expecting a response, some sort of ping, even a wireless telegraph signal. He’s so still, as he lays there.

She squeezes his hand, activates his haptic sensors.

But there’s just nothing from him. 

Just… nothing.

Well, not nothing. Nothing connected to her. But he’s still definitely on.

“Spine?” She takes his shoulder, intending to shake him a bit. Snap him out of it maybe. 

His turbine kicks higher, right as she grabs him, faster than it should go, especially right now.

He’s far too hot, she notices. Especially when Pete has a dozen fans on him to combat how much he’s overheating. His turbine whines, high pitched, shrill inside him, overwinding his gearbox coil, but he’s not moving, he shouldn’t be boiling over, especially not so much .

“Shit,” Says Peter, beside her, he’s set down the grinder, “Shit shit shit,”

His boiler’s connected to his central turbine and a piston, with the steam directed where relevant depending on the task. Pistons are for walking, direct movement, turbines for winding clockwork and turning the generator. It's more complicated than that, obviously, but it's simple. She works the same. Their blue core heats the steam, their steam powers the rest of them through pistons and turbines and gears. 

“He’s overheating Pete,” Rabbit says, helpfully. 

“I know, Rabbit,” Pete snaps, reaches into The Spine’s chassis before he pulls back, hissing, shaking his hand, “Ow, ow, nope, too hot, where are my heat resistant gloves? I need to cool him down,”

Inside The Spine’s chest, his pistons fires, off beat, and his leg snaps out, jerking, and Pete jumps, “Fuck.” 

“Uhh Pete?”

“He’s wound himself up way too far. Swapping to the pistons makes sense, swapping pressure away from his turbine, so he doesn't snap his coil, but— he’s burning way too hot for this, it's—  oh shoot, that’s it, his core’s overheating, Rabbit, and— systems are trying to cool down— is he out of water?” Peter leans his head down, steam curls up and around his neck, “Nope, no, water’s fine— oh jesus christ on a cracker that’s way too much steam pressure— shoot, shit, uhhhh, shoot. Where are my gloves?” 

Peter whirls around, starts rifling through drawers behind them, Rabbit’s eyes are locked on the inside of The Spine’s chest. 

“Rabbit— if you can, there’s a red valve, should be at a T section of pipes, open it, please, slowly, slowly, I don’t know why on earth his safety valve isn't venting it, we need to decrease pressure before his boiler explodes,”

Oh. That's bad actually. 

His gearbox coil stops clicking as his piston keeps firing, quicker, and with it The Spine practically convulses, piston turning gears moving his legs, unorganized, unresponsive, practically. She can feel how hot he’s running, even from next to him, she scans inside him for whatever Pete just said.

She sorta wishes he were still not moving, This is worse. 

“I see a blue valve?” She says, reaching for it.

“Red, Rabbit,” Peter snaps, and she jerks her hand back, “Red is hot steam, blue is water,”

“C-c-can you find your gloves already?” She turns to look at Peter.

He’s already turning back around, gloves shoved onto his hands. 

There a pop, from inside her brother’s chest, and Peter pounces, practically. But the gloves he found are too short, even she notices that. They don’t quite reach his elbows, even, but he’s reaching into The Spine’s chest, turning the steam valve (oh, that red valve), and then there is steam. 

Clouds and clouds of it, pouring into the air. Peter’s shoulders shake, and he is prooobably burning the heck out of his arm, but—

The Spine’s piston stops, all of him stops, dials and gears as the pressure decreases to none.

He just stops. 

Powers down. Bright blue of his core going from glowing sky electric to a pale overcast gray.

Off. 

Her and Peter meet each other's gaze.

A silent but clearly there oh shit hanging in the air as he pulls his hand out of The Spine’s gearwork. 

“Well!” Peter says, somewhat hysterical, “That was fucking eventful, Rabbit!”

“Pete are you—” 

“I’m fine,” he says, turning away from her, inspecting his arm. She can see how his hands are shaking, “Nothing wrong here, I— well, let’s, let’s give him a few minutes to cool down, I— Will be fine,”

“Let me s-s-s-s-see your arm.”

“It’s nothing, Rabbit,”

“Pete.”

“Nope, No. You— stay here, with him, I will be right back.” 

He snags his cane from where he hooked it on the table and ducks into his office before she can so much as reach for him.

She looks down at The Spine, powered off, and just—

Eurgh. 

Awful day, huh?

…

Peter A. Walter VI is having a wonderously horrible day. A day. A day that was meant to be productive. He was going to help The Spine. He is now hunched over his office sink, running cool water over his arm.

He may have burnt himself a little. 

Just a little bit of a slightly large second degree burn up his arm. Its—

Not that terribly bad? He’s burnt himself before. He grew up in a workshop, he knows burns. And it's a normal burn, and not a blue matter burn, at least. 

He has work to do. Important work! And he can’t have just taken The Spine apart for nothing. He has to at least get The Spine’s boiler and venting fixed today, if any of this is indication. Figure out why his safety valve didn’t vent any of the excess pressure, figure out if he’s still even working.

He has to deal with his own arm first, though. Unfortunately, he is very human. And humans tend to have mechanical limits based on “pain tolerance” and "exhaustion". Copious amounts of coffee help the second. And he’s already taken his pain prescription this morning, so…

ANYWAY. His arm. 

Regulations say you have to keep a first aid kit stocked in any workshop. The Walter Robotics Company is proud to comply with all OSHA regulations. 

The last time he burnt his arm he could use his teeth to hold the other end of the bandages. This time, as he leans backwards into his chair, he may simply have to get creative. 

He has a vice, on this desk, maybe if he traps the end in it—

“Peter?” he cringes as the door creaks open, he’d hoped Rabbit would leave him be.

She’s probably upset at him again, this is fantastically bad, and The Spine may be a bit broken now. 

Rabbit pokes her head in, “Are y-you okay?”

He turns to look at her.

No buzzsaw. Okay perfect everything is fine. Including him! It's only a bit of a burn! That’s fine. 

“A-Okay,” he says, quick, turning his arm where she can't see it, no need to worry her, despite that he’s sort of struggling to get the bandages on. “Stay with The Spine,”

“Nah,” she walks over, careful, “Do you need help, Pete?”

She worked in the medical tents in WW2. He knows this. 

He knows this. 

(Nurse robots were an idea, way back then, that his great uncle had floated around. He’s found the receipts that a few were even put into manufacturing. Upgrade had modeled for the line. Of course, none of them were Blue Matter powered, nor nearly as sophisticated, but marketing is everything.)

“It’s just little tiny a bit of a burn, Rabbit—”

And then Rabbit’s grasped his hand, pulling his arm into the light. He hears her ticking get louder as she peers down at his arm.

Maybe it's not a little tiny burn.

He’s already blistering for several inches up his arm. Stretching from where his gloves ended up to his elbow. 

Rabbit looks between his arm, and his mask. 

He can hear her judging him.  

“Didja put anything on it yet, Pete?” she asks, careful, pointed, “Cuz this needs aloe, or somethin',”

(The nurse robots had been on the receiving end of many complaints, so he’d read in the recall reports. Something about them not understanding the concept of pain.)

“What if The Spine turns on?” He complains, but doesn’t pull back, “I don’t want to worry him more, if you’re not there.”

“He’s out like a busted lightbulb, Petesey, probably won’t start on-on-on his own unless we reboot him, it's just— you’re the one who’s in here burnt, and human, you like, have flesh?”

She plucks the burn cream from the first aid kit, “When your paps was a little kid he once stuck his entire hand on a hotplate. I fixed him up, cuz’ Four was out in the yard doing chores or something, he was grounded for sneaking out with Miss Holly again, and Wanda was napping upstairs, and Three was wayyy too busy, even though he was supposed to be watchin’ him,”

He sighs. Looks up. “Please open that for me, I can put it on myself, Rabbit,”

She does, and he dips his fingers into the cream tentatively, as he rubs it on. It helps with the stinging. And presumably other things. Flesh and healing is not his best point. 

It would be simpler to have mechanical arms. He could reach into any machine without gloves and simply fix them if they break. Unfortunately he is behest to the whims of flesh. 

“So— I can go find Chelsea and Camille and they can put Spine back together, we can f-f-f-f-fix him later, Or Beebop can page them,”

“I’m fine, Rabbit,” He’s worked through allergies, colds, flus and fevers before. A little burn can't stop him. 

(A solid work ethic is necessary for any companyman.)

“You sound j-j-j-just like The Spine, when you say that,” 

He squints at her. Maybe being a workaholic runs in the family. 

“Could you help me bandage it?” he asks, finally, “It's— a teensy bit hard to do one-handed?”

“Course, Petes.” 

She unspools the gauze, and, with steadier hands that he’s used to her having, wraps up his arm. 

“...You really don’t gotta finish him today, Petes, The Spine would get it.”

“You heard that pop, Rabbit. And I at least have to check the pressure safety valves, before he can be powered back on, unless he reboots himself, in which case.. We hope for the best,” 

“Camille and Chelsea can still do that, Pete.”

But he wants to. They certainly could, but he wants to himself.

Rabbit’s not terrible at bandages, but it still stings. He bites at the inside flesh of his mouth. 

(Teeth are annoying, he decided long ago. Why would the bones most important for life rot? Terrible design.)

Finished, Rabbit folds down his shirt back over the bandage.

“Do you need a bit, Petes?”

Hm. Does he need a bit?

Probably. His hands haven't stopped shaking. (Human nervous systems would be significantly more efficient if you could directly control the chemicals released and when. Why are adrenaline and dopamine locked behind controls he cannot consciously use?)

His arm hurts.

(He is aware it is injured. Why can’t he simply turn off the feeling receptors to his arm and work regardless?)

“I— may run upstairs and take something,” 

Pain medication, probably. He has some for his bad days. Chronic pain runs in the family, or maybe Great Grandpa Peter Walter II carried the cane for fun, and he and his dad just got screwed over by a bad luck of it. Or cumulative blue matter DNA damage. Or something. 

His face being melted didn’t help it much. He takes medicine on bad days for the hurting.

Today was an iffy day, he just wanted to make sure he was in good shape for all this. So much for that!

He reaches for his cane, pushes himself up, slow, “Burns hurt, Rabbit, nearly as bad as my nerve nonsense, hah,” 

He will get more coffee as well. He needs more of that if he’s going to be any sort of productive today. 

He exhales, steadies himself. Starts towards the door. 

“Been a bit since I took my morning one, anyway,” 

Rabbit nods, “Do ya need me to spot you on the way up?”

Possibly. Theoretically yes. But he will be fine. 

“No, Rabbit, we do have an elevator,” He says, waves his non-burnt hand, “I’m A-okay.”

She doesn’t believe that. He can tell, but she nods, after a moment,

“I’ll stay with The Spine then, Petes”

She should. He could turn on at any point, once he’s cooled down. 

Even if he shouldn’t. Or if it's unlikely without him being jumped back online. There’s enough potential energy in his gearbox that he could probably turn on any second.

Hopefully not, though, because he really needs to check his boiler first.

…

Rabbit watches Pete off and up the elevator, then goes and sits back next to The Spine. 

Sets her hand inside his chassis, taking temperature. 

He’s still warm. Not burnin’ up anymore, though. Certainly still warm.

“You’re a mess, Spine,” she says, “Love ya, though, but wow, you’re a mess.”

He couldn’t have at least told her hey rabbit, I’m going to freak the hell out and nearly explode, sorry before he did it. Rude. 

He’s way too wound up. Still. His turbine kicked way too high for him to just be laying motionless. Delicate (and with thankfully heat resistant hands) she reaches into his chest, and cranks his central gears a few rotations. Just so the coil doesn't snap. Release some tension. Hers snapped once. That was not fun. It was mid-show, too! They had to finish without her!

He doesn’t move, as she does it, beyond every gear in his body spinning, but as she reaches for his hand to twiddle with his fingers a bit more, his core flickers bright electric blue. She pauses, exhales a burst of steam, braces herself for him to turn back on. 

So much for Pete checking him over first.

So much for that. 

Chapter Text

He-

Where is he?

It's sort of a fractured thought, as his photoreceptors begin receiving again, as his haptic and light sensors fill him in on the environment around him.

He is in the interior of a building. There is only airflow from above, indicative of ventilation or fans, and a distinct lack of pollen or other contaminants circulating in the air, which could only refer to inside air.

He is on a metal… bench or table. He is on his supine. His temperature is in the red. (Why?) Lights buzz above. Where—

Oh. 

No. No. He knows where he is. As his photoreceptors focus, things narrow down considerably in location. Peter must have been working on him. There must have been a failure of sorts. He has rebooted. 

This is not difficult to put together. 

So why, why is his location tagged in his memory as [Augmentations Workshop; Government Facility; City Unknown, State Unknown; note: possibly California or Arizona?]

He’s not—

He’s—

He’s not— he is not there. He is not there. 

He knows where he is. He can see where he is. The manor. Peter’s workshop to be more specific. He is not in a nameless lab with nameless people with saws and far too many vices and all else. 

“I’m fine.” He says, he lies, before he can even fully figure out the arrangement of his limbs, or who he might be talking to. 

Rabbit is here. This is probably the first thing he is aware of. Before he even quite puzzles out which way is up and which is down. 

She’s crouched over him, repeatedly pinging her location at him. Which is, in fact, [Robotics Laboratory; Walter Manor; San Diego; California]. So there is no reason he should be disoriented about this and about where. Because Rabbit is here. And obviously so is he. 

Nevertheless. Saying he is fine is not even a remotely convincing lie. His internal thermometers are significantly far into the red, and he rebooted due to a failure. 

But Rabbit is here. So it is fine. Even if he is lying. Regardless. 

“I am fine?” He repeats, again, but it's less of a statement, and more of a question. He looks at her. Up at her. Two motions, x axis of movement, y axis of movement, adding them together to move in a diagonal seems difficult for right now. Direction in general seems difficult. 

She is above comparatively to him. Directionally. Probably.

He is only about 70% sure of directions right now.

“You’re doing kinda shit, actually, Spine,” says Rabbit, “Honestly, you really shoulda stayed off, Pete wanted to make sure you weren't gonna explode. Do you feel like you're gonna explode?”

Well that's concerning.

His physical diagnostics for the cause of the crash return. 

His back plating has been removed. He apparently crashed due to rapid decompression through his main steam release valve. This was preceded by significant overheating of his boiler by his core and overpressurization of steam within his boiler. 

Diagnostics indicate that there may be minor damage to his boiler’s sealing, and that his steam-safety valve catastrophically failed, as it did not release excess pressure during an emergency situation.

Well, isn’t that just peachy?

Does he feel like he’s going to explode? 

“I believe I am- operational?” He manages between thoughts, “But I- I think I should remain horizontal until Peter confirms this.”

They’re replacing his ventilation system. Presumably. He thinks he recalls that. If his safety valve broke, that would make sense. But then why did he overheat, then, if they were—

“Good. Spine ya really should’ve just told me you didn’t think you could handle a spinny thing by your neck,” Says Rabbit, she crouches down, stares right into his eyes, “Because that was AWFUL.”

Oh. 

Yes. 

The angle grinder.

He was having his face replaced, is still having his face replaced? (Is he? Where is Peter?) 

He was having his ventilation restored to previous functionality, having the opportunity to actually look like himself again. 

And now it seems he is not. And it seems this happened because he panicked, overheated his core, and nearly exploded.

Otherwise known as he was extraordinarily dramatic for no reason, and he should have said no. He agreed to this. And now he will likely need to be in here for twice as long while they make sure he hasn’t broken himself. 

He is entirely dramatic. 

Rabbit's hand clicks against the back of his neck, where the saw was, several… seconds? (Has it been seconds or minutes?) ago. 

His time logs make no sense right now. Why did he write his last known location as in 1955. That is wrong. 

Still though. He shudders as Rabbit’s fingers trace the jagged edge of where his smokestack was. Protective, as she curls over him.

He is being entirely dramatic about this.

“So– are you good, Spine?” Rabbit asks, “Because you don’t look very good, and you’re sorta starin’ past me, and if you overheat again while Pete isn’t here I don’t know how to fix it, and it's freaking me out, so just, stop thinking about whatever you’re thinking about,”

He could say he was fine. Would say it, if he were even relatively sure she would buy into it. But he's— malfunctioning, and she's looking at him like he’s going to break. And he does not particularly think a lie would hold water, right now. Or would be good. 

“No.” He says, and it's too honest.

“D-d-d-didn't think so. So uhh, Pete stepped out for a sec or two. He wanted to get more coffee from upstairs, he thought you’d stay off longer. So– we’re stopping right? After Pete makes sure you’re fine? Cuz Pete still needs to fix your neck and that’d be after he makes sure you’re not, I dunno, leaking. Do you even want to keep going?”

Does he?

Well. No. 

His neck needs to be cleaned up to install anything new. And if he has to have anything spinning and loud near his neck he—

He will have a very bad time. Again. As evidence shows.

But-

He turns his head into Rabbit’s arm. Exhales steam from his mouth. 

He doesn’t particularly want to wait significantly longer to look normal again.

“I don’t know, Rabbit.”

…

There was not much talking, while the government technicians were working on him. They had his schematics that Three put together. They had their own ideas of what they were augmenting into him.

Part of the contract was any changes made to him, of any kind, would be thoroughly documented. 

Despite this, there was not much talking to him about what they were doing.

Three had given instructions, specific, detailed, on how to power him off for the more significantly invasive procedures. The ones that involved ripping out his father's intricate work and replacing it with things of modern war.

He had not known Peter Walter III had agreed to that degree of alteration until he saw the signature himself.

They would reach inside him, into his chest, tighten valves. Fluid would stop circling in his core. His boiler would cool rapidly, steam would stop forming.

And then it would be oblivion. 

Until he was back on again, of course, to test his new weapons in the testing rooms. 

Rinse and repeat. 

He never knew quite what he was waking up to. Off. Augment. On. Test. Off. Augment. On. Test. Off. Augment. On. Test. Off. Augment. On. Test. Again and again and again and again. 

He never knew what they were doing.

But the only thing worse than when he was off, was when he was all but locked to a work station, and they were doing something with him awake. 

Restrained to a table, vocoder disconnected from his main circuits.  They learned early on he would talk too much, complain, as pieces of him were taken out, disposed of, as new pieces of him were added in, if he still had steam circulating; if his body was still responsive. 

He had promised after the first time they took his voice he would be quiet going forward. They had not listened. They disconnected it anyway. 

(One technician had said it made him sound too human, if he could ask what they were doing.)

(He had wanted to scream that he was alive, but he could scarcely even move.)

They would decrease the flow of blue matter through his core to stop him from overheating. Cap the rate at which he operated. Give him orders, abruptly, to move or to try something, to make sure he is still operational. 

It was distinctly hard to follow, running on half power. But he did his best to listen. Even as they took him apart. Even as they broke him.

He did his best to listen. Thinking maybe, maybe if he was good enough, things wouldn’t be quite so awful.

They might even listen to him, if he was good enough, if he was awake.

Being off was awful. Being off meant he had no idea what had been done to him when he came back online.

But being on during was often significantly worse. 

Being on during was feeling them take pieces of him away, and knowing he would never be the same again.

That was all significantly worse. 

…

Rabbit reaches down and hugs him. It's an awkward angle. Him with his back open, head to the side, her beside him, but he needs it. 

“You’re gonna be fine, The Spine,” She says, “Pete will get you all put back together, and figure out if-if-if-if you’re okay, and you’re gonna be fine.”

He doesn’t know what he wants. He presses his head into her. Trying to stop thinking about terrible things from so long ago. 

He can’t afford to overheat right now.

Rabbit being here, at least, makes it all significantly less terrible. 

“You’re gonna be fine, The Spine,”

…

Coffee. A fascinating substance that could be much improved by being more efficient and more caffeinated. There are certainly ways to increase the caffeine amount, but such ways are not nearly as time efficient as pouring a cup of coffee from the coffee machine and leaving the kitchen. He, Peter A. Walter VI would be significantly more of a coffee snob if it were faster to acquire more grandiose objects of coffee.

He likes coffee. Or did. Well– he still does, but part of it was the methodology of consuming it.

Drinking coffee through a straw is hardly as satisfying as sipping a cup. It also makes him look silly. He is supposedly an exhausted scientist drinking coffee to get through the day. He got his degree for this. And for what. To drink coffee from a silly straw?

It's terrible.

But he is the one who selected the silly straw from his drawer of straws. The metal ones while significantly more sophisticated looking are slightly more difficult as biting them to hold it in his mouth is worse.

Nonetheless, he has encountered a slightly different, still coffee related, but more injury related problem.

When you use a cane, you have one free hand.

When you are him, with a burnt hand, and a using-his-cane hand, you suddenly have a perfect, ready to drink cup of coffee, with a bright pink silly straw, and a marshmallow in it, and absolutely no hands to bring it downstairs with. 

So either he holds it with his now-rather-burnt hand (which is a bad idea) or he innovates. 

Aurgh. 

Now don't get him wrong. Innovating is his job. But awkwardly transferring his perfect coffee into a closed container, awkwardly wrapping a tote bag (which might be Auntie Wanda’s?) over his shoulder and kind of precariously figuring out how to drink it as he walks? That isn’t exactly stunning innovation. 

He doesn't like closed containers. There are significantly more steps to get the straw into the cup, and his lack of depth perception thing makes it a little annoying. 

Nevertheless, coffee, a shot of water, painkillers, and a dash of patience can fix anything. He heads back downstairs, ducking around a corner to avoid his father. 

It's not that he doesn’t want to tell his dad he may have slightly broken The Spine. 

It's just his dad would insist on going downstairs and fixing The Spine himself, if he knew. Which could maybe be easier? Probably would be, given the having two functioning hands and retaining two working eyes thing, but The Spine wouldn’t know, and this is already a disaster and a half, so that would only make this worse if he came online and didn’t even know who was working on him. 

Dad’s tuning up QWERTY in his workshop today anyway. 

That whole conversation would be embarrassing. ‘Hello son why is your hand burnt?’ ‘Oh you put your hand into the Spine’s chest cavity while it was burning hot. Why did you do that, son?’ ‘Yeah Dad The Spine was overheating and his safety valve failed.’ ‘Ok. So why weren't you wearing heat resistant gloves, son?’ ‘So you put them somewhere other than their hook and couldn’t find them?’ ‘Right clearly I, Peter Alexander Walter The Fifth need to go down there and fix this mess you made- and yada yada yada yada yada whatever .

He has it covered, imaginary dad who exists in his head to lecture him. 

Stepping into the elevator, having thankfully dodged his father, Peter leans back against the wall. He should really look into making this thing taller one of these days.

He should look into fixing a lot of things around here.

The elevator. The lights in the kitchen. The emergency broadcasting systems. The nuclear bunker’s water supply. The elevator’s buttons that stick. 

It’s—

A lot isn’t it?

The company’s been solidly in the green for nearly two decades now. Their robots are still running. Sure, maintenance isn’t cheap, but.. 

But that's how it is. 

And he’s in charge of it now. And The Spine’s been running around since 1955 without any decent ventilation system and Hatchworth was downstairs for 72 years. And Zer0 didn’t even have a fully functional chassis when he came upstairs. And what else.

He has so much to do.

The workers help. His staff are the most talented staff in the world. Most of them. But he has so much to do.

The elevator doors swing open, (he can admit to the necessity of doors on an elevator) and he walks back out into the hall to the robotics laboratory.

Aaaaaand The Spine is online. Already. And is folded into Rabbit’s side, not looking at him. 

Great. Wonderful. Stupendous. Fantabulous. Absolutely brillianterrific.

“Hey Pete.” Says Rabbit. “Sooo he turned on?”

He can tell that.

“Uh, Well!” He sets his bag down on the counter, leans against it as he pulls out his coffee, takes a long sip through the silly straw, “At least you didn’t explode while I stepped out, The Spine.” 

“I dunno if he wants to talk right now Petes,” 

Her hand is curled around the back of The Spine’s neck. Her fingers shine bright copper where the polishing belt dented them, one of them is quirked at an odd angle. 

He will be needing to fix that, later. 

The Spine - speaking of The Spine - slowly, too slowly, and too rigidly, really, turns to look at him. It isn't a very dynamic movement. Pivoting at one joint at a time. Power saving mode perhaps? Prioritizing limited movement to limit possible damage?

Peter takes a deep breath, exhales against the back of his mask. 

This is perhaps, in fact, a disaster and three fourths, actually. 

…

Rabbit’s hand stays steady against the back of his neck. Even as The Spine pivots to look at Peter. 

Can he talk? 

He debates this internally a moment, before realizing how stupid not talking would be. 

Who is he kidding? He can talk. He is plenty capable of talking. Even if making the words make sense is more effort than it should be. 

“Will you be finishing my ventilation?”  The Spine asks as Peter scans him over. 

He did nearly break himself. 

Peter would likely prefer him not to break himself. 

“Uh,” says Peter, sets down his coffee, “Shoot, Spine. I mean- not if you don’t want, and I need to check on your main systems first.”

“I th-th-th-think we should stop,” Rabbit says, “Once ya make sure he’s all good, Petes. Cuz this sucked.”

Does he want to stop?

If it were simple, yes. Yes he would like this to be over. 

It is not simple. And there is another solution. 

An uncomfortable one, but it— 

It is better than being aware. 

“I would like to be finished today.” he says, though he feels rather like collapsing. “Please power me off, before we continue.” 

It was better, wasn't it?

To blink and be back entirely different?

No sawing or ripping while aware.

It'll be better, he thinks, if he's off. Besides, the main horror of it was not knowing.

He's being repaired, and he’s getting a new ventilation system. And Rabbit is here. 

Rabbit will make sure he's fine. 

“What.” Rabbit says, and The Spine hears her stutter. Hears her fans kick on, pipes hiss. “No. No? We’ll stop, Spine. Peter, Petes we're done. This sucked. We're done. T-T-T-This was a great try! We’re done. Time to clean up and go home. Pete, make s-s-s-sure he’s okay to get out of here and put him back together now.”

“No,” The Spine doesn’t dare move, sit up, even moving his hands feels like breaking some invisible rule, “No. I am entirely tired of overheating, Rabbit,” 

“Spine, no. That's— no. We are donezo. D-o-n-e.” She spells out. “You're f-f-f-freaked out or somethin’ Spine.”

“I would like to be powered off and completed, Peter. I want this over with. I’m tired, Rabbit.”

“Peter lets g-g-g-get him back together, He’s not thinking right,”

No.

There is a sinking sensation as he lies there, still, that if he does not do this now, he won’t ever. He won’t be able to lay back down. He will think of saws and breaking and he will not agree again.

This is overdue by decades. By over half a century. 

He needs this done. 

“Rabbit, are you sure?” Asks Peter, and The Spine hates this.

Everything is horrific.

“No.” The Spine says, a bit louder, “Peter, I need this done, I would rather not be present during, please power me off for the duration. I would rather not be operational right now and have this done sooner.”

“Spine, you are n-n-n-n-not thinking right. No. The last time y-y-you were off during-during-during major repairs like this-this was after Vietnam.” Rabbit crouches closer, her hand still against his neck, “And that was s-s-so bad.”

(He’s long known what happened then. How he had been cracked apart by the weapons inside him.)

(He remembers seeing The Jon's shattered chassis, and being angrier than he’d ever felt before, and then—)

(Rather nothing, because he'd sort of exploded himself.)

“...Spine,” starts Peter, wary, “Are you sure about this?”

“Peter, this is s-s-s-stupid. He’s not thinking clearly.”

“Rabbit, we- we talked about this a lot. He’s in charge, he can say what he wants to happen.”

“Yeah but this is different, Petes,”

“If he’d prefer being off, then that's what we’ll do.”

Two things are true. 

One. He needs to be restored to full functioning capability. Everything is set up for it.

Two. He feels horrible. The idea of being worked on more is horrific. 

If he returns to the hall of wires right now, he will never be able to rationalize this being worth it to himself again. 

It is now, or not at all.

“Peter, please power me off and finish today.”

“...He said it, Rabbit,” Peter steps forward again, “Here, Spine, let's get you—”

“Do you want to be back on f-f-f-f-for your face?” she cuts in, “Or just be off for the v-v-v-ventilation and boiler and internals and all that?”

Oh.

He doesn't know.

“Ventilation only.” External is easier than internal. External doesn't involve saws. He can always change his mind. 

“...Right, okay,” Peter’s hands find his shoulders, “I’ll wake you up then, alright? Right now, let's just get you other side up, I haven't unscrewed anything yet, so you’ll be fine if we move you,”

Perhaps he’ll regret this later. Right now he just needs it done.

…

So. Sooooo. So, Rabbit hates this actually?

The Spine is all stiff, as Peter sits him up, turns him onto his back, supine. He’s all single movements, the most efficient action to complete the moment.

Rabbit should put her foot down. Make this stop. Make Peter get the hell off him. Pete should be resting anyway, his arm is hurt, and instead they’re doing this nonsense. 

But— he did clearly say he wanted this, and she’s supposed to listen to that, maybe, probably. 

But this is so bad, actually?

And she hates this. 

Hates how tense she is, hovering, as Six turns the valve for blue matter circulation in The Spines core. Stops circulation. Hates the way the neonic blue flickers, dulls to a lifeless pale sky as Peter turns him off. 

This sort of thing is what nearly killed Pappy. Her. Her and her core. Her and her arguing. Talking. While her core was worked on. 

This is what killed Two and Guy. 

But Six is careful, closing valves, thick gloves, (his gloves were in the one drawer he didn't check, apparently) disengaging the heat, unplugging it from the rest of him, and The Spine… powers off. 

In Vietnam, the main blue lines in his chest had breached, blue matter fluid had spilled all through him. He’d been inoperational in seconds.

She’d spent hours gathering every piece of him. His core was intact, barely, but disconnected from every major system. 

He was off until they could get him home. Shoved in a lead box. It was horrible.

The Jon at least could talk, even if his legs didn’t work, even if he would glitch into the same sentence and repeat it for hours straight. 

Eventually he collapsed too, aware, halfway, but not enough for it to matter, and it was just her left. 

Upgrade was usually the one in charge of fixing them in combat. Upgrade didn’t go with them, that time. 

Being as careful as she could didn't make a difference in the end, and she eventually broke too.

This is just like that. With his core disconnected. He's silent. Paused. Empty.

She hates it.

Hates the dead signal connecting to him gives.

Hates this. A lot.

But….

But maybe The Spine had a point. 

He doesn’t have to be aware of Peter’s angle grinder, if he’s not anything to begin with. It's probably a hell of a lot more peaceful. Maybe. Waking him up will be its own problem, though.

“Just gettin’ dead air from him, Pete,” Rabbit straightens up, “Lets get this done with, I-I-I-I’ll stay here, make sure nothin’ goes wrong,”

“Of course. You can- would you like to hold tools, maybe? My hand is still a bit borked, you holding stuff would be helpful.”

She can do that. 

“Will it make this faster?”

“It probably will. Here,” A wrench is shoved into her hand, a pipe into her other. “Hold these, thanks,”

The Spine is just so still. There is no one in there right now to panic. There is no one there for her to message reassurance to. 

He’s gone. 

It’s probably for the best, if it scares him this bad. At least he won’t remember it all this time.

She will though. For him. She saves a photo or a dozen, as Pete leans over The Spines chassis, starts poking around with his boiler. 

The Spine will want to know.

Probably. 

It’d be better if he could see it later, at least. 

Better for her to make sure of that, at least. 

In case he needs to.

He can’t know what happened when he was in that government place. He can know what happens right here. 

Right now. 

At least when he wakes up this’ll be over with. 

Chapter Text

The first aspect of powering on after being fully shuttered off is disorientation.

Sensors coming online one by one. Physical space becoming three dimensional. Global coordinates loading in. Degree angles of positioning. Photoreceptors acknowledging light. Light processing into shapes, organized into recognizable concepts. Haptics delivering physical information. Position of his limbs loading into logic. Figuring out where within physical space he is, and in what orientation his pieces are in. 

He feels different than before. 

Physically, the first thing he notices as he comes online is how much cooler he's running. The old warning dial of you're too warm is quiet and in the green for the first time in decades.

He has no idea how long it's been.

The second aspect of powering on is, apparently, Rabbit. Her face is a centimeter from his, and she is, as he becomes aware, holding both his hands.

“Hey The Spine.” She says. 

“Hello, Rabbit.” He looks up at her. 

There are no windows down here. And he is not facing the clock. 

“How are ya feeling, Spine?”

“Not too terrible now, Rabbit.”

“You looked pretty terrible. Petesy set you all up though. Y-y-y-you’re all fixed from earlier.”

“I would hope.” 

“You scared me pretty bad, Spine, springing that on me. Powering ya off.”

“Well it worked out, didn't it?”

“Yeah and I got s-s-s-stuck holding wrenches and tools whatever. I got photos of what he was doing though.” She bonks her forehead against his. “Pete wants you to test some of the new hardware before he starts on your face. I needed to make sure you were fine first. He did most of the tests with you off though, so mostly he just needs to make sure the wires are all connected right. Y-y-y-you're as assembled as he could get ya without needing you to test things yourself.”

He’s certainly running cooler than typical. But perhaps that's just because he was off for an extended period. 

“Well, I’m sure I could handle him doing wiring, Rabbit.”

“A-a-a-anyway, you’re okay?” She leans closer, peering at him.

He’s—

He doesn’t know. 

He feels okay. Possibly. He feels tired. He is not particularly scared right now.

He may also not be the best judge of how he is right now. 

Rabbit was here. She didn't leave. It's not like no one knows what happened. And- 

He doesn't know.

“...I am serviceable, Rabbit,” 

She squints at him. 

“You nearly exploded earlier cuz you got so scared.”

Yes and it's mortifying that he did. 

“...I am alright, and not about to explode.”

She squints at him more, but pulls back, then pulls him up, with her. Sitting him up. “Y-y-you're back isn’t fully screwed shut, Spine, but it's just the plating, all your fans are back on, already, anyway, PETE! He’s good, come out of your office- Spine, Pete went and grabbed some human food for human mouths and human teeth, from his office, while you rebooted up, cuz you were taking your s-s-s-sweet time this time, heating up, and he was getting p-p-p-peckish.”

Peter walks around the corner, out of his office. He’s holding a donut, mask pulled up a few inches, so he can eat. 

The Spine leans forward, and—

Hm. 

Well that's immediately different. 

Steam exits from behind his head, as he shifts, vents into the air. No noticeable jump in temperature of his core, less building pressure in his head. 

It's normal.

He’s normal. When was the last time he vented steam normally? Or felt functional in the correct way?

“Thats just what I was about to ask,” Peter says, shoves the rest of the donut into his mouth, The Spine only just sees his lips quirk up into a smile, just as he pulls his mask back down.  

He spends a moment chewing, before walking forward, “Any excess steam should go through your face vents, when I install them,” He ducks behind The Spine, leaning forward, “And how uh, you doing alright? Temperature holding steady? No leaks in your core?”

The Spine feels Pete’s hands on his back frame. 

“My temperature is cooler than typical. My core readings are slightly normal.” 

Rabbit squeezes his hand, and he is so grateful for her. 

Her just being here. 

“Good. Can you kick your core up a bit in heat? I want to make sure you’re working right.” 

He does, and-

Well.

Steam runs from his neck and out into the air behind him. At a constant rate, steady, no pressure behind his photoreceptors, or against oil lines, no far-too-hot condensation dripping inside his plating. 

It's normal.

He hasn't felt normal in decades

The pipe is installed so his fins pull heat from it, radiating it outward, where the air cools it. Cools him.

“Perfect, great, brilliant!” Pete grins, “The Spine, okay, could you draw in your fins for me real fast? I tested them, but the wiring was my only possible failure point, other than uh, possible heat issues,” The Spine pulls them in, they retract in easily, Peter must have oiled the gears for that. “Aaand, those are not a problem! Perfecto, great, sweet, love that for us, that means you should be entirely functional, Spine, is it alright if I screw your back shut? I have a uh, normal, screwdriver, in case a drill would not be great, right now, so I’m using that,”

Why would he use a normal screwdriver—

Oh.

“You can use a drill, Peter,”

“Oh, good. Good. Getting your face off would have taken a million years. The amount of screws under your wig is far too many, and I was worried that-”

“A drill and a saw don’t feel remotely similar, Peter.”

“They kind of do? To me?” Peter says, “They both go whirrrrr and have spinny bits?"

“These are the only traits they share, Peter,”

Behind him, Peter arranges his plates back into formation and screws him back together. 

His diagnostics system returns a code indicating that he’s whole. Peter steps back, and The Spine lets himself lean sideways into Rabbit. She wraps her arm around him, steadies him. 

“So uh- Spine,” Peter says, walking around to his front. “Are you sure you want me to put your face on today? That can wait, if you’re not up for it?”

He feels better. He’s running better than he has in years.

He would rather this just all be done with today. Even if he is about to crumple. 

“Go ahead, Peter.” He says, "I'm sure."

Peter nods. 

This isn't... nearly as invasive. Regardless. He will be fine. 

Just like before, Peter starts by clicking on the music and unscrewing his photoreceptors. 

It's more uncomfortable than anything. He can deal with uncomfortable.

His head comes off slowly, still. But that won’t be an issue for long. Peter’s hand holds his jaw steady as he takes out the screws one by one. 

The Spine is so tired. 

He can hear Peter humming along to the music. The Spine tries to focus on his new hardware. Rabbit’s hand against his side is steadying. 

Ideally, he will not need to do anything of this sort again anytime soon. 

Ideally, when this is done, he can lay down forever.

“Rabbit?” Says Peter, “Could you do me a solid and put your hand- yeah you’ve got it,” Rabbit’s hand presses against the side of his head, where Peter just finished unscrewing plating. She holds it up so it doesn't hang awkwardly. “Thanks,”

Peter walks around to the other side of him, unscrews the other line of screws opposite to the ones he finished. The drill buzzes. 

“Hey uh- Rabbit, could you- if you can use both hands, could you hold up this side of his head too?” Peter asks, from somewhere below his head, and The Spine jolts a bit. That is not where he thought Peter was.

Rabbit’s other hand leaves his side, and she turns just enough he’s not pressed against her shoulder. But her hands are both against his face. 

He is not alone.

“Y’know, Pete, first you use me as a free wrench holder, now im a head holder, kinda rude of you.” 

And then Pete’s pulling the metal upward, and he has to recalibrate his balance as his head is pulled up and off. 

Rabbit’s arm snaps back around him, steadying, as he tilts too far sideways, bracing him upright as he rights himself. Or tries too right himself. 

His head isn’t exactly light, nor is it easy to account for how to balance without it, especially without his photoreceptors to easily calculate direction and distance. 

Her fingers lock against his inner frame, keeping him steady, as he tilts a moment.

"All good?" Asks Peter, as The Spine hears his previous head be set down with a dull clunk. 

"I've g-g-g-got him, Pete,"

"The Spine?"

"Go ahead, Peter," He's mostly balanced now. Even if directions are perhaps somewhat confusing without optical sensors.

It's.. different, but distantly familiar, as Peter fits the new plating to his head. It's less cumbersome, thinner, than his old face. Lighter. That isn't necessarily a bad thing. 

First Peter attaches his internal jaw joint followed by the plating covering it. Then his topmost faceplate. Followed by the jointed plating down the sides and the topmost metal of his head frame.

He remembers this. This pattern of assembly. 

It’s- normal.

Steam rises from behind his head, and he feels normal.

“Hey Spine- could you move that jaw joint for me?” Peter asks. “Making sure nothing's grinding,”

He obliges. Moves it open, shut, open, shut. Let’s Peter test the range of motion. 

“Still not perfect- but better than it was, with the gears here….. Does it feel like it's catching anywhere, Spine?”

“Not catching, Peter.”

“Brilliant. Thanks, The Spine.”

Peter starts tightening all the screws, making certain everything is anchored in place. He tilts The Spine’s head slightly, which, with his receptors off and his directional sensors all but offline, is somewhat dizzying. 

The music cuts off, and The Spine blinks as Peter slides his photoreceptors back into their slots.

“Perfect, I think- there we go! I think it looks like the photos, but I think Rabbit would know better than me, Rabbit, how’d I do with the machining?”

Color and objects and light come back as the channels add together, he focuses his gaze to the keyhole of Peter’s mask as he gets his bearings. 

“Hmm, I don't know!” Rabbit pulls from his side.

The Spine can hear how much she’s holding back her delight, as she twists around him to get a better look he can see it in how she's leaning so close to him, receptors scanning back and forth.

“IIIIII think we need a mirror, Petes! Didn’t we have a mirror for me in here?”

She squeezes his hand. 

“It’s right in my office,”

Peter brings it out.

And The Spine sees himself.

Himself. 

His face.

It responds, as he closes his jointed eyelids, as he opens and shuts his mouth. 

It's been so long since he recognized himself.

“Oh.” He says, is all he can say, as Rabbit swings her arm around him.

“Look!” She laughs, “Look at you! Normal!”

He’s going to cry. There is oil in his eyes. 

He turns his head, to see the sides, how the metal splits over his ear, internals only just visible from the sides and back. Metal shell, movable, segmented, along his neck, to lead into his spine. 

He’s himself again. 

“Now uh, again, Spine, if there are any problems you have with it, I could put the one on the counter right back to before—”

“I would perhaps like to melt the old one, Peter,”

“Uhhhh, how about we wait a few months? And this is just the prototype face, things might catch, in odd spots, y'know? I’ll fix any issues as they come up, but we know that one—”

“Peter. Even if this breaks every other day I would rather have this.”

“...Sweet! Okay! Well, let's try to avoid that, because I would rather it not do that, because that would be bad for you, but I’m glad you like it. And it is a prototype, so I will be machining a better one,”

He feels better.

He feels so much better.

“And— Also! The Spine, how’s that vent system running, any heat issues?”

“I am running better than before, Yes.”

“Perfect, perfect, that’s- that is brilliant, I’ll- would you two like me to skedaddle? As long as you’re running well, I should clean up all my tools in here, and maybe start figuring out the non-prototype one, and—”

“Shhhshhshshsh,” Rabbit interrupts, squinting at Peter. “Petes, I think you should go take a sleep. It's been a-a-a-all day. And your arm is kind of messed up. How about me and Spine catch you in the morning? To chit chat about heating and systems whatever.” 

“His arm?” The Spine asks. 

“Don’t worry about it, Spine,” Rabbit drags him to his feet, off the table, and he staggers a moment before he finds his balance. 

He feels normal.

He feels better than he has in decades

“I’m alright, Rabbit,” Peter starts, “I’m truthfully not that tired-”

Rabbit steps forward to Peter, leans close to him. “I will snitch to your mom, young man,”

“Rabbit,”

“Go sleep. And eat probably. Do human things flesh boy.”

Peter sighs, leans on his cane, “Fine, fine. I’ll clean up in here in the morning.”

Peter steps out, and Rabbit falls back to his side, drapes her arm over his shoulders.

“You look good Spine,” she drags him forward, towards the freight elevator upstairs, “Like, good good, not like a dollar store human from mars,”

“I did not look like that.” He’s smiling though.

“You did. Now you look normal. Debonair or something. I missed you looking normal.”

Not Go Spine Go. 

“Don’t say I look debonair.”

“What, did I ruin it? You absolutely love looking debonair-”

“Rabbit, shush.”

He’s-

He’s tired

Rabbit cackles with laughter, though, as she leads him forward.

“Anyway, we're going up to my room. And we are going to watch a movie and you are going to feel better. To match looking better.”

He surely looks better now, than before, at least. Even if he hasn’t quite been this exhausted in..

Ever. 

He’s himself, now, though. 

For the first time in decades, he’s himself.

Perhaps things really are looking up?

Chapter Text

Rabbit's room. 

The Spine has always liked it. It's nice. Bright. He himself has the hall of wires. Keepsakes and collections far up and out of sight. It's perfectly serviceable, and well enough out of the way that he has few people wandering in unannounced.

But it's dark in the hall, and somewhat unhomely. 

Rabbit’s room is quite the opposite. 

Her window overlooks the yard and the duck pond inside it. Down in the water, a mallard dips beneath the surface. In the evening, you can see the sunset through the glass, as rainbows dance through the prisms she has hanging in front of the windows. Keepsakes and photos dot the walls, and while the wallpaper they picked out a decade or so ago is dimming a bit, the flowers still frame the wall nicely. 

It's a nice room.

Sometimes he thinks he should finally bother to make a decent room for himself. They certainly have the space. But he likes the hall of wires fine, really.

Regardless. 

The Spine has no problems letting Rabbit bring him up here, especially right now, especially after today. Especially when the only thing he particularly wants is to rest.

She drags him to her bed, pulls him down with her, sends them crashing against the bedding together. 

Usually The Spine is not a large fan of plush surfaces. They are uneven and warm, and have a tendency to trap heat and steam. He has no need for cushioning as he is made of metal, and oftentimes it's just tedious to work around fabric with so many moving parts that cinch or tear it. 

But for the first time in decades he's not along the edge of overheating. No sensors red and complaining. 

He doesn't even need to worry about it.

Besides, Rabbit is holding him. 

Her bed is mostly for decoration. They don’t need to sleep. It stays neatly made most of the time. It creaks beneath them, under the weight of two multi-hundred pound robots. 

If he had experienced possibly any other day, he would be skeptical of this. He’d rather sit up, sit at a window, be nearby rather than tangled entirely in her arms.

But right now, after all that hullabaloo, resting with her is the most appealing thing to do.

He has had an entirely awful day. 

Rabbit is holding him. He is not currently beyond admitting it to himself that he needs it. 

Humans have skin. Have distinct insides and outsides of their bodies. Robots are not necessarily the same. Certainly he has outer plating, but that's no more his skin as a shirt he wears. And reaching under it is no more within him than taking off a shirt would be. 

Holding humans is an exercise in fragility. They break so easily. Cells bruise, blood restricts with pressure, carbon-construct bones snap with falls. Holding humans is somewhat terrifying. You have to be so careful with the pressure exerted. With every movement as to not snap them.

Robots do not break in the same way. 

With that in mind, if Rabbit held onto a human the way she is holding him, they would be dead. Or at least broken.

The pressure exerted against his plating would snap a human’s bones. As it stands, it's rather comforting. 

Steam vents from the back of his neck, an exhale, expelled not from his eyes or his mouth, but normally.

He’s functioning as intended.

What a thing. As intended. As recommended. With full ventilation capabilities. 

“A-a-are you okay, The Spine?” Rabbit asks and—

And isn't that quite the question?

“I am tired, Rabbit.” How to answer when you sort of feel like your entire sense of self has shifted? And it's all better, but everything has been awful. Everything has been mortifying and miserable.

He is better. He is also significantly worse. Emotions are difficult.

“Yeah but is that okay or not okay, The Spine?” Her hand finds the back of his neck, again, she runs her fingerpads along the now-smooth edge of the vent in his neck. “You can be tired and fine or tired and about to implode and break into a million bits and I would r-r-r-really like to know if it's that one?”

His metal casing fits against his new systems entirely. His shirt doesn’t quite work with it yet, not perfectly, as he will need to have his clothing tailored, but it's better. Costuming isn’t in the budget today. 

“...I have not been functioning this well since 1954. I am exhausted. And this was entirely awful.”

“And y-y-y-you’re not about to freak out on me?”

“I do not think so, Rabbit.”

Steam winds up through her gears, through her vents in her face. She pulls him closer. Curls a hand beneath his plating, holding him close. 

“Do you think you’d ever want to go back to your smokestacks? Like before? It'd be a lotta work I think to set that up again b-b-b-b-but– I dunno, Pete Six could figure that out.”

It would be a lie to say that there is no part of him that finds it appealing. 

But no. 

No, he really rather doesn’t.

No, they were large, heavy and cumbersome. Difficult to tailor around, and far more linked to his military weaponry than anything else. They made transport difficult, and he would often hit them on doorframes.

They were a distinctive part of his silhouette for the first half of his life. He had no say in their removal. They were his. He certainly ran better with them. 

He’s running better right now without them. 

And… well. His modern fins are cooler. 

He has to admit that. They’re cool.  

“...No. No, Rabbit, I like my fins.”

He really does, is the thing. At first he hated them, but perhaps that was more a hatred of being ripped apart and rebuilt without knowing what was even happening. 

They’re cool. They glow in the dark on stage, and his silhouette is striking- full of sharp angles and points. And they retract, so he hasn’t gotten caught on a doorframe in decades. 

He’s come around to them. 

“Like you liked y-y-y-y-your bad face or like you like your cool coat?” She asks, squinting. 

“They give a nice silhouette.” He says. Which is nothing. His smokestacks gave a similar effect. Then:  “And they sort of make me think I look like a dinosaur? Which is cool.”

She pulls back, and he looks at her.

She stares at him intensely for a few seconds. And he doesn’t know what she’s thinking.

Was that the wrong thing to say? 

“A d-d-d-dinosaur?” She asks, then, eyes shuttering as she starts laughing, loud, as she smiles, “Of course it's a dinosaur. You look g-g-g-good, Spine, your new face. The Jon’ll probably be ecstatic about it— and huh, Zer0’s never even seen you normal, huh?”

It's a rather punching thought, even as Rabbit laughs. 

Zer0 hasn’t seen him normal. 

That's awful.

But that’s a problem for later. Not now. Right now he would like to lay here, and let Rabbit hold him. 

But…

“What if Zer0 thinks it's too different?” He asks, “What if he thinks it’s bad?”

Rabbit’s laughter dwindles, and she pauses, tilting her head. 

“The Spine, What?”

He feels stupid.

“What if Zer0 thinks I look too different?” He repeats, though he knows it’s silly. 

“Zer0’s just gonna be really glad you’re happy with it, The Spine,”

He feels- 

Uneasy? Stuck? Irrational? Like there is something wrong with him that can not be repaired?

He does not like the thought of not being able to be repaired.

“..Yeah.” He exhales steam through his neck. “Rabbit, do you remember when I got back and The Jon didn’t recognize me at all?”

Rabbit pulls closer to him again, her arms wrap around him tighter. Crushing. Comforting. 

“How The Jon just kept asking Three where I was for days after, and how he refused to interact with me?”

“He knows what y-y-y-you look like, The Spine. And that won’t happen again. You look normal now. Not new. Just normal. And he figured out my everything out really fast, so, and if he has a problem then I’ll knock his head on straight,"

She has a point. Perhaps. But it took Three taking The Jon aside for anything to actually click for him.

…And perhaps The Spine has just had a horrible, too-long day. And far too much change has been done to him. Even if it's for the best.

“...I’m tired, Rabbit.” He hides his face in her shoulder. He doesn’t want to see how she’s looking at him. 

“Well,” She squeezes him, “I’m gonna put on a movie, and we’ll lay here and you d-d-d-don’t even gotta think.”

Rabbit puts on Mac and Me, and The Spine lets his eye shutters click shut. 

Listens to the music as the movie starts. 

Today was awful. 

But at least he can rest now. 

At least he can rest. 

At least he won’t be sent to perform on stage for thousands of people after being changed for the worse. 

At least he won’t ever fight in a war again. 

…

Hours pass. Rabbit cycles through movies. He lets his systems run on power saving, going into standby mode as he cycles and runs updates on drivers, software, and hardware reports.

It can be compared to sleeping, if you were still mostly aware, but not actively thinking. 

His boiler is running only intermittently, to charge his internal batteries to run his computerized parts. 

It's peaceful. Rabbit’s gears hum beneath his auditory sensors. Steadily ticking and whirring as she every so often squeezes him closer.

He needs the quiet. 

It's good, after today. 

It's calm.

Of course this is Walter Manor, and quiet never lasts long at all.

Their quiet is abruptly broken by The Jon slamming open the door. It rattles backward, and The Spine startles- he jerks, slamming his head up and into Rabbit’s face, knocking Rabbit’s head all but sideways, as he turns to see the door. 

“RABBIT,” The Jon asks, louder than anything The Spine has possibly heard ever, “Do you know where the salsa is?? I need it!! Oh! Hey The Spine—”

And then The Jon freezes, just, staring at them as The Spine pulls himself up. Still. Paused mid motion. Photoreceptors wide, stopped and focused directly on The Spine’s face.

For several seconds, as Rabbit spews static beside him, hands righting her somewhat diagonal face, The Jon just stares.

“Hello, The Jon.” The Spine finally greets. 

“Hello, The Spine,” The Jon stares. Shifting his weight between his legs. Skeptical and distinctly nervous as Rabbit fixes her head. “Why is your face normal? You don’t look like that now, The Spine.”

“P-P-P-P-Petesy fixed him,” Rabbit cuts in, as The Spine starts formulating a response. She swings her arm around him, “And I-I-I-I don't know how chatty The Spine is gonna wanna be right now, The Jon, he's had a rough time and—”

“He doesn’t look like that now, Rabbit. Why does he look like that again?”

“I just said, The Jon, Six fixed him—”

“Peter said he was going to look like that forever, Rabbit,” The Jon argues, edges closer towards them, “The Spine, why do you look like that?”

“The Jon,” The Spine starts, switching to more active programs, turbine spinning actively now, though it’s still slow as steam pressure builds in his boiler, “I think I look nice,”

The Jon blinks. Eyes clicking several times. Frowns. 

“You do look nice, The Spine,” He agrees, skeptical still. “But you said your face was going to be flat forever.”

Sometimes The Jon has trouble following things. Big changes. Deviation from routines. Sudden unexpected differences.

You just have to be patient. He gets there in the end.

“I didn’t like when it was flat, The Jon” The Spine says, and The Jon nods twice, agreeing.

“I know. You didn’t like it at all.”

“So Six said he was going to make me a new face.” The Spine gestures up at it. At himself. “And he did.”

“But Three said your face was this one now and I needed to understand that forever and stop thinking your face looks like this because I was being a moron again.”

Rabbit and him look at each other. 

“W-w-w-well The Jon, I think Three was being stupid. Not you.” Rabbit cuts in, “And Six did a great job. C'mere, The Jon,” Rabbit reaches forward, extends her arm as she does to grab his wrist, pulling him a few steps closer until he’s in front of them.

The Jon is all scrunched up, standing there, still staring at him.

The Spine looks back at him. “Do you want to touch my face, The Jon?”

The Jon nods. Doesn’t move. So The Spine reaches out, takes his hand from Rabbit, and lifts it so his fingers sit against his face plate. 

“So, The Jon, I have my face again,” He curls in The Jon’s fingers inward, into the space between his outer plating, and inner jaw mechanism, “Six restored me earlier today—”

“Yesterday,” Rabbit corrects, “It's mornin’ Spine.”

“Yesterday.” The Spine amends. 

The Jon stares at him, still, a long few seconds, as The Spine curls The Jon’s finger joints around the edge of his face plate. 

“....But Three said it was gonna be bad forever and if I kept asking I was being stupid.” The Jon mutters, though it's half-hearted.

“I'm personally glad Six restored it,” The Spine holds his hand there. “And I am running much better, The Jon.”

The Jon reaches inside his face, feels the internals within. The Spine turns to let him.

“You're running better?” The Jon asks, “Like you can sprint really fast again and not overheat and shut down like you did?”

He probably could. He hadn’t thought about that yet.

“I would assume so.” He has not tried. 

“Good.” The Jon says, though he still sounds a bit wobbly and confused. “Six put it back to how it was?” 

“Six restored my face to its former appearance.”

The Jon nods, slowly.

“Three wouldn’t have liked that.”

“Jonnie, Three wouldn’t have liked a lotta things we’ve been d-d-d-doin’ lately,” with her free hand she gestures at her own face, and then her bosom. The Jon laughs a hiss of steam.

“You also look nice Rabbit,” he says.

Then The Jon snaps forward, and before The Spine quite processes what he’s doing The Jon is hugging him so tightly his chassis creaks a bit.  

The Spine, after a moment of processing, wraps his arms around The Jon. 

“You’re finally better now?” The Jon asks, small. 

“Mostly. Six will be machining a non-prototype face for me. But it will look the same.”

The Jon hugs him tighter.

“And you’re staying looking normal now?”

“Yes, The Jon. I would hope.”

Then, as quickly as he snapped forward, The Jon pulls back.

“You look better,” He says, firmly, sounding more steady now as he rocks on his heels, beginning to smile, “I didn’t like how you looked with the new-old face. It was weird. And this is good.”

“Thank you, The Jon.” The Spine smiles, “I do look rather nice.”

The Jon nods aggressively. Agreeing. “Yes. You look normal. Anyway, The Spine, I have a question.”

The Spine tilts his head, braces himself a bit. “Yes, The Jon?”

“Are you going to come to my Hot Sauce party?”

He blinks.

“Of course, just make sure to write down when it is on my invitation,”

The Jon nods. 

“I'm glad you feel better, The Spine!” The Jon steps back then, turns to Rabbit. 

“Rabbit,” He seems fine now, “You didn’t tell me where the salsa is,” 

“Oh, I dunno The Jon,” she shrugs, “Go ask Annie, she might know!”

The Jon beams, does a little salute before waving goodbye, and then he’s off. 

To plan more about the hot sauce party, apparently. 

The Spine lets himself clunk back against Rabbit, she pulls him back so they're a bit more horizontal, more like they were before The Jon came in. 

“H-h-h-how long has he been saying he's gonna throw that party, The Spine? It’s been a-a-a-ages,”

He’s laying sideways in her arms, head settled on her shoulder.

“When they introduced fire sauce to taco bell, Rabbit, in the middle of 1998. So that would be 14 years.”

“Y'think he'll ever finish it?"

“I doubt it, Rabbit.”

“Well,” The Spine lets his eyes shut again, still tired. “I’ll go if he ever does.”

“Maybe he’ll actually have a giant quesadilla?”

“That would be horrifying, Rabbit.”

…

He spends a few more hours idling in standby with Rabbit, occasionally sending status reports on his internals to Six.

“I h-h-h-have the distinct feeling that something has changed, Spine,” Rabbit says, as The Spine slowly sits up, “You look like y-y-y-you stepped on a huge egg and it exploded and inside was green goo,”

“GG wants me.” He says and Rabbit laughs, falls sideways against her bed. 

“I c-c-c-could like, tell her to buzz off?” Rabbit offers, “If ya want, The Spine”

It's tempting. But it's been long enough, and he should probably test himself out properly before Six gets antsy and wants him to start walking laps. 

“It’s only bringing her scarf to the dry cleaner,”

“Again? That place was scary,” Rabbit squints at him. “Why does she gotta clean it dryly anyway? Wouldn't that just be, I dunno, a fire?”

“Oh, well, I don’t know. And I’m just going to make Chelsea do it.” He stretches out his arms, hears his joints hiss, then leverages himself up. “She will, and regardless, GG with unmediated access to a jar of jam is rather a terrifying prospect, and I will be on my way,”

“Jam? Someone gave GG Jam?”

“I know. She’s probably gotten it everywhere.” He finds his balance, smiles to Rabbit, “I will find you later?”

She catches his hand. Squeezes it. “You’d better. And if I find you broken in a random hallway later I’ll break you myself after Pete fixes you.”

“I’m alright, Rabbit,” He pulls back, “And GG will come find me, with her jam, if I do not hurry.”

“Do NOT let GG bring jam in my room, Spine.”

“I won’t, Rabbit.”

Rabbit shudders, and he turns to go.

Regardless, he should show everyone his new face. 

He does look very nice. 

Chapter Text

It is not typically a long walk from Rabbit’s Room to GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa, previously known as the living room. GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa is only down the stairs, around the corner with the bird painting that he dislikes, and then through the arch.

Typically. That is the route one would take. Down the stairs. Around the corner. Through the arch. It is a simple route.

Today it is not a simple route. 

Marshmallow has taken residence in the main hall. Laying on his back, stretched out. Impassable. 

While it is somewhat adorable, every time The Spine gets within a few feet of Marshmallow’s paws, he’s batted back to the beginning of the hall.

So. 

Safe to say.

Going the short way down to GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa will be impossible. He will be going the long way. Down the freight elevator, almost all the way down, then up and into the kitchen, and then up again and around into GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa. 

He hates calling it that. He will have to steal the sign GG made and put it somewhere else. Perhaps the room where Marshmallow’s litter box is will suffice. 

It's as he’s walking up to the elevator he sees Upgrade.

Upgrade, who has her left arm folded up back and in, and her katana brandished out. Upgrade is, as Upgrade does, trying to pry open the elevator doors. With the blade of her sword.

Yet another day in Walter Manor, he supposes.

He’s excited, nearly, for her to see him. His face. Him.

“Hey there Upgrade,” he walks over, “So.. I take it the doors are stuck, up here?”

“It's been TEN MINUTES,” Upgrade complains, falls forward against the door, “And Marshmallow is BLOCKING THE STAIRS!” She huffs, stomps her foot, loud. Her hoop dress bounces as the sound echoes. 

“Yes.” He agrees, tilts, to stare at the doors. “That’s why I came up here,”

“Yeah I know. You don’t like the elevator.”

It is sometimes unpredictable and gets stuck. It also is loud as it goes down. Six keeps saying he’ll fix it sooner or later. 

Five also said he would fix it if it ever actually broke. 

Two had also stated he would fix it. He was actually going to. And then the incident occurred. And the new elevator plans were vaporized along with most of everything else Two was working on. And everything else of Two. 

So. He doubts they are going to fix it soon..

“Marshmallow is still by the stairs, so you know.”

“UERGH.” Upgrade twirls around to look at him, mouth already open to talk, but she freezes on a dime the moment she sees him. Joints locking, pausing, as she processes. 

He can’t help but smile, as she loads, he turns his head a bit, to look at her, so she can see him head on. He watches as the only movement Upgrade makes for several moments is locking onto his face, her photoreceptors flicking back and forth, lidar scanning him, mapping his new face.

Then she reanimates, bouncing a step towards him. 

“WHAT.” She screeches, breaking back into movement, hands flying up and over her mouth, as her Katana swaps back to hand and digits, “THE SPINE!”

She sounds ecstatic. 

Upgrade hadn’t gotten scared like The Jon had, all those years ago. She never didn’t recognize him. She never doubted it was him. She was just angry. At everything. At Three for sending him there. At her inability to fix him. At war. At weapons. At a lot of things back then.

(There was a reason she ran away.)

(Not wanting to be changed for the upcoming War wasn’t a small part of it, though.)

“THE SPINE,” She repeats so loudly that several paintings on the wall rattle, so loud her vocoder scrambles, “DID SIX FIX YOUR FACE?”

“Well,” He takes another step towards her, he can hear one of her fans spinning at a frequency significantly higher than usual, whirring loud, excited, “It isn’t as if it restored itself, Up-”

He is cut off by Upgrade dashing at him and shoving her fingers into his jaw joint, muffling him mid word. 

“I can’t believe you didn't tell me, The Spine, HEY, was this why Rabbit was lookin for photos?” She drags him, physically, down so he’s crouching, head at her eye level, “Rabbit kept telling me she couldn’t find them, and ooooooooooo,” 

She pulls his jaw open, shoves her photoreceptor right up against his face, flashlight behind her eyes kicking on, ticking and whirring as she looks at him.  

“It looks good! You look BETTER! And you know I would know, The Spine, I had to fix you sooo many times, you were clumsy,” She chatters.

He takes her wrist, pulls her fingers out from between his jaw joint, so he can speak, “I am aware, Upgrade,” 

“I am never gonna let ANYONE change your face again— oh huuhh, hey,"

She pulls her face back from where she’s pressed her forehead against him, squints up at him. One of her fingers trace the edge of one of the new vents in his cheeks.

He glances down at her. Her eyes glow from the lights behind them..

“Hey, The Spine, did you know the edges on your new face are bad?”

Oh. 

Ah.

Well.

There’s a heat in her voice, she pulls back, staring at him.

He hasn’t quite heard that anger since she was pacing back and forth in ‘55 saying she was going to cut Three’s face off and see how he liked it. 

(She’d been down in the workshop with him and Three, while Three looked through him. Tested him. Figured out what they did to him. Upgrade was supposed to help Three make sure he wasn't broken. She’d wanted to break Three before they were done.

She told him once that was a reason she didn’t want to go to Vietnam, that if they made her pretend to be fine with breaking him once, doing it again was worse.)

“Oh, I ah- I am currently wearing a prototype, Upgrade,” He assures, squeezes her wrist as he holds it from his face, “Six made it in under a month, rather a rush job, he will be putting together a more seamless final version over the next year or so, while I work out if there are any issues,”

“Hmmmmmmmmmm.” She hums, he can hear her fans kicking on, “The Spine, you deserve better than terribly cut metal.”

“Well Upgrade, I think it's better than-”

“Well of COURSE it's better than the other one.” She stares into his eyes. Then shoves her photoreceptor back against his face, examining more, “But Six usually is really perfectionist about all of this, and that's nice because he keeps us the same. And I like that.”

“Six usually has significantly more time to plan and roll out changes for us. He worked quicker than typical for this,”

Upgrade huffs. Then she twists, snaps her arms around him in a tight hug. “I know. Your new face sucked. It was obvious. And you look nice. Other than the bad metal cutting.”

“Thank you.” 

He really means it. He wraps his arms around her, hugs her back. Exhales steam from his new vents.

He’s significantly improved by this. Even if he isn’t finished yet, per say.

“Spine.” Upgrade says, suspicious from somewhere buried in his shoulder, “Did Pete also fix the vent in your neck?”

“Yes. It’s nice.” 

“So are you gonna get your smokestacks back?”

“No, ah, no.” He does prefer the fins, despite everything. “Those are staying gone,”

“Boo.” She reaches up, finds the vent in his neck, he doesn’t mind.

She was one of the first to see what they had done to him, anyway. The weapons soldered into him, the new face, the broken pieces. 

“You needed those. Now show me your internal heat readings!”

“Upgrade I don’t see why-”

“You’re always WAY too hot, The Spine. I wanna know.”

Upgrade shakes him a bit. “Excuse you. In a normal QWERTY filetype.”

“You really do need to let them boot you to the new QWERTY version,” 

“Nope!”

He takes a moment to downgrade it to the previous file format. 

Upgrade stays quiet a few moments, and The Spine hears her processor kick into high, as she thinks through the file.

Sometimes he worries about how outdated the software she runs is.

She’s been hesitant for years to let them do much of anything to her beyond major bugfixing and basic frame or drive repair. 

He understands it perhaps, but it does mean she’s slowly growing unable to read some new filetypes. 

Then she hugs him closer. 

“I wanna see how your head goes on later. In case.” 

In case. 

In case of war. In case he breaks. In case somehow she is the only one around to fix him again.

He knows she dislikes repairing them all.

He knows she still feels guilty for not going with them to Vietnam.  

“You will not need to fix me, Upgrade,” He can hear the way she is spinning, processing, buffering.

“Maybe I would!” She argues, grasping him tight, and, well. Well. Who is he to say otherwise when every other month he convinces himself they will be sent to War again?

“Not today, but I’ll think about it.”

She hugs him tighter. 

…

Sometimes he forgets how small Upgrade is, compared to him.

Upgrade wasn’t quite finished when their father first showed them to Delilah Morreo as singing automatons. They all weren’t quite finished then. Only mostly completed. A work in progress.

Rabbit didn’t have a functional voice yet, though she still played music wonderfully. Father had wanted Delilah to model for her vocoder - she had, eventually, before she passed, but that voice was broken with Rabbit’s core, during..

That incident, later.

He himself had a voice, even at the beginning, and something similar to final functionality with his guitar. 

His voice is based off his fathers. It's his, now. Technically Rabbit’s is as well - what with the replacement being his backup one - but she’s tweaked the settings on hers enough it's hardly the same. 

Hatchworth was mostly complete, then, though he only had drums capabilities, and not bass. Bass was a later upgrade. 

Upgrade and The Jon hadn’t been finalized into the act yet. Upgrade hadn’t been incorporated beyond simple percussion. She’d been more of a concept. A finished core and skeleton of a body, finished enough to just about stand and think. And The Jon…

The Jon hadn’t had anything beyond his model number until after the war. Father was significantly more preoccupied with The Jon’s…. Well, everything about the explosion and portal in him than finishing who would become Upgrade. 

Of course, when Miss Delilah Morreo passed, and when Mister Thaddeus Becile did… all that, they were finished a different way than their original blueprints of music intended. With war foremost, music set aside. 

The first war started, and Upgrade was fully completed in form and function then. As opposed to before. 

She was finished to scurry behind them, Him, Rabbit, The Jon (though he wasn’t called that then) and Hatchworth as they tore through the elephants. She was enough of a weapon to free herself if pinned, but she wasn’t exactly built for crawling into an elephants core and exploding them from the inside out. She was all soldering wire coiled inside her, and methods to melt it to fix them. She was all drills and pliers, spare parts and cutting implements to fashion new parts for them from fallen elephants. 

She replaced Rabbit's buzzsaw when the blade dulled, changed his wires when his tesla coil shorted out, refilled The Jon’s rocket launcher fuel and replaced Hatchworth’s ammunition when needed. 

Upgrade - her name - came from the act of that. It had more of a ring to it than Repair or.. He doesn’t know, Robot Who Makes Sure They Don’t Break Entirely While Dismantling Elephants. 

Still. 

She's hugging him. And now, 116 past then, she’s practically buzzing under his arms. 

Upgrade folds up small, when she’s held. All dress hoops and frills over a body built to be slight, and fixable with anything she can get her hands on. 

She is nothing if not tenacious. 

There was a reason she managed fine on her own for years with no one to repair her. 

…

Back in ‘55, because everything leads back to 1955, (and everything in 1955 leads back to 1950, and so on,) when Three had finished making certain the government’s technicians had not irreparably broken him, he’d dismissed him and Upgrade back upstairs. The Spine knew, even then, that he was going to fume in his workshop until morning about all this.

Three………

Peter A. Walter III struggled, after his brother’s death. 

The Spine knows this.

It had been terrible. Everything in 1950 had been terrible. Rabbit had been inconsolable. Three had been despondent. Mark had a toddler Five and could hardly handle the pressure. Wanda only laid in bed for weeks at a time. 

Then 1951. Mark crashed his car. Three days of Wanda at his bedside. Another grave in the yard. The others had hardly grassed over. Mark had only been 26.

Five was only 4. 

It had been terrible. It had all been death. It had been Wanda crying into Five’s hair as she passed him to social workers. She couldn’t care for him. She could hardly care for herself as it stood. It had been Three not even showing up to try and argue custody. 

Peter A. Walter III did not know how to manage the business without Peter A. Walter II. 

Peter A. Walter III had been hoping Mark would figure it out. 

And now, only a year after Two and Guy Hottie, Mark was dead. 

The Spine knows this. The Spine knows all this. 

1952 had not been much better than 1951.

It had at least been quieter. Three managed to sell off some property. Keep the lights on. 

1953 was worse. Wanda was a ghost in the halls. Four was only 16. Three was hysterically trying to manage money. 

Three was trying. 

The Spine would never deny him that.

He was trying.  

The Spine was terribly terribly aware of all this. The Jon was hardly anywhere to be found those days. He and Mark had been close. Hatchworth was still in the vault. Upgrade was trying to be useful, just to try and keep things going. And Rabbit?

Rabbit was hardly holding on. She blamed herself for it all. 

(Three blamed her too. Beneath it all. Three blamed her too.)

(It was her core that killed Two and Guy. It was Ignatius who took it. But Three couldn’t be angry at a man miles away from them.)

In 1954 the government reached out regarding upgrading him. They were willing to pay a lump sum of money to get it done. Enough to pay off their debts and to get them going again. 

There was no world where Peter A. Walter III refused. The Spine has always known this. 

There was never a world where Three could have refused, with how things were going.

While he was gone Ignatius Becile visited the manor. Him and Three struck a deal, so The Spine pieced together much later. 

Why?

He doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know why Three offered Ignatius anything. 

But when he’d finally gotten back home, after everything, in 1955, Peter A. Walter III pieced through his chest, pieced through the new weapons and wiring within him wearing an expression locked in battle between fury, disgust, and envy. 

He had been furious as he compared The Spine’s new body to the new blueprints the government provided. 

Upgrade stood next to him. Cold expression. Holding tools. Helping where she could. 

He remembers, distinctly, locking eyes with her at one point, and just seeing fire as she stared at him. 

But then Three had taken out his photoreceptors to check the wiring, and he couldn’t see much after that. 

The Spine knew Peter A. Walter III hated it. This new him. What they had done to him. Though The Spine also knew Three hated much of everything then. 

Perhaps Three was mad with grief. Perhaps Three was falling apart. Perhaps he wasn’t even thinking straight then. 

He knew Three spent his nights pacing the halls, shouting off Wanda when she found the energy to try to help, before he left. He knew Three spent days in the workshop trying to make anything to make them money. He knew Three was failing at it.

His upgrades, and the money Peter A. Walter III received for them were crucial. 

Critical, even.

It doesn’t change it, though, that even now, still, he apparently cannot handle saws being near his neck. Because of what happened. 

It doesn’t change that, even if Peter A. Walter III was mortified with anger and revulsion at the changes made to him. 

It doesn’t change the fact that he felt ruined after. And only now, 60 years later has he realized that. 

Even if Peter A. Walter III’s health deteriorated after, between spending nights pacing, days in court against Ignatius, evenings working on them all - It doesn’t change it. Not really.

Three cared. In his own manner. About all of them. He cared about appearances. He was at his limit for every moment after Two passed. He was past it much of the time.

He….

Three….

Three should have listened to Rabbit. About herself. Back when he still had caring in him. When Two was alive. Him and Two both should have. 

Three should have insisted The Spine’s face stay his own. 

But Three was trying not to need to sell off assets. Three was trying to not need to sell off them. 

Three cared. His care did not spare any of them much of his temper or his opinions. But he spared them being separated or worse. 

They are still performing 60 years later. And sometimes, The Spine doubts that would have happened if Three had not let the government upgrade him. 

If money dried up so thoroughly back then.

Nonetheless. 

Upgrade. 

Upgrade was with him, down, down in what was now only Three’s workshop that terrible night he came home from the government's workshop. She was there while Three made certain he was not irreparably broken. 

Afterward, when Three’s delirious exhaustion and despair bled through into his trembling hands, and Three finally couldn’t bear to keep tinkering with what was left of him, Three sent them upstairs to return later for second checks. 

Upgrade closed up his chest on the work bench. Not Three. Three vanished into the office. Upgrade helped button up the shirt Three had grabbed for him. 

They both pretended to not hear the way Three was throwing things at the wall in there.

Upgrade walked him upstairs.

She caught him as he all but short circuited the moment they were out and alone. 

She'd held his hands apart and away from his chest to keep him from ripping out the weapons they put in him. 

She’d snapped at Wanda to get away from him, when she heard all the commotion and came to check.

She kept him from shattering his own face until he’d managed to calm down enough to do more than try and rip himself apart.

After that she'd walked him to her room. Sat him down. And just talked at him about anything and everything until he stopped overheating - until he stopped shaking.

She didn't believe him when he told her he was fine.

He never expected her to.

Now, 60 years later, she's hugging him with just as much strength as she did when she held his arms from his chest so long ago.

Crushing.

Comforting.

Familiar.

It was a long long time ago. 

…

Regardless.

Upgrade is very small. She could also throw him if she wanted to. Spring loaded limbs. Strength deceptive of her height.

And as she keeps him at her eye level as she scans his new face, he is very aware of that. 

…

“I do feel just swell, Upgrade,” He says, finally, as she holds him, “About looking normal again.”

Looking recognizable again. 

She’s small. But she is perhaps crushing him a little. 

“Hmm. I do like that, The Spine.” Upgrade finally leans back, then pauses, straightens up before she pulls a handkerchief from her pocket and shoves it at him.

For a moment he’s puzzled, but oh. 

Ah.

He has oil pooling in his eyes.

“And I think you might need this?”

“Oh,” He says, steam drifting up from his cheeks, “Yes. I do.”

He hadn’t noticed it. 

Say what you will about the old face. It was horrific. But the oil tended to drip down the inside of the plating rather than the outside.

He wipes his under eyes, then his cheeks, before handing it back.

She shakes it out, before stowing it back into her pocket. Steam rising from her own vents, as she straightens back up. 

There's a quiet moment then, of her just staring at him.

Mutual understanding that they’re in the future right now, maybe. Or perhaps Upgrade is just judging him.

He never can tell with her. 

Then she shakes out her arms, drops her hands to her hips, tilting her head. “Well! The Spine, where are you going down the elevator?” She asks. “Back down to Pete for something? I could go with you?”

This is of course code for if he’s fiddling with your head let me watch please let me watch I want to know. Or perhaps it’s as simple as her being bored. 

“GG needs her scarf dry cleaned.” He answers, watches, immediately, as Upgrade’s face scrunches up.

She squints at him, shifts her weight back and forth. 

“Oh! That's.. nice,” 

He can tell by her voice that isn’t the answer she wanted. 

Upgrade and GG….. get along best far apart. In separate rooms. Where they cannot argue.

They argue.

They argue so loudly. He has never heard arguments so loud as them. And he is including everything Rabbit has ever yelled about in her life in that. 

They can never agree who the princess is. And GG calls herself a queen. And Upgrade hates it.

It's a headache. He doesn’t get headaches. And it is a headache.  

He asks why GG can’t be Queen and Upgrade be the Princess. Apparently it's because Upgrade wants to be the highest rank. She’s older and taller and better. And GG gets offended at that. 

So then he offers GG gets to be Princess and Upgrade gets to be Queen, but that always goes over even more poorly, because Upgrade gets upset that he’s calling her a monarchist (What??) and GG gets upset because she thinks being a Princess is boring. 

Nothing works. 

They can’t both be Princesses because apparently that gets confusing. He thinks all of this is confusing. 

Little sisters. Or honestly all sisters. Because sometimes Rabbit also wants to be Princess. And Upgrade always says yes to Rabbit being Princess (because when Rabbit and Upgrade are both Princess it apparently isn’t confusing?) then they both gang up on GG and GG starts breathing fire again. And then Rabbit starts breathing fire. And it's really all a mess. 

Regardless. 

GG and Upgrade get along best in separate rooms with no tiaras involved. 

“So, Spine, I’m gonna go see if the cat moved!” she finally announces, “You will page me if the elevator gets here, capiche?”

“Alright then, Upgrade,”

She dashes forward and hugs him again, tightly, but only for a moment, and then she’s off and around the corner.

Sure then. 

Okay. 

Yep. 

He doubts Marshmallow has moved. 

He steps to the elevator. Ignores the katana scratches in the metal. That's normal. And he will accept it. 

He reaches out, presses the call button himself. 

He supposes he’s not in any real hurry. GG has at least stopped messaging him every two seconds. 

Chapter Text

The Elevator arrives. Rather quickly in fact, after The Spine presses the call button. The doors swinging open. 

Hm. 

Did… Upgrade… not press the button…?

…

The answer is probably not. And he is not particularly surprised by this fact. He will spare her that indignity and message her in several minutes. Once she gets down to Marshmallow, when a reasonable amount of time has passed that it is clear she did not just… Forget to press the button to call it. 

The Spine steps into the elevator.

His foot hits something with a clang.

He looks down. 

Hm.

Okay, then. 

“Oh, uh,” he greets, squinting down, “...Hi, Hatchy.” 

“Oh hi, The Spine!” waves Hatchworth, who is, for some reason, laying on his back on the elevator floor. 

Again, just another day in Walter Manor. 

“Well uh, hi there,” he returns the wave, “So, uh, Hatchy, what are you doing?” 

He presses the down button on the panel, carefully steps over Hatchworth, leaning against the back of the freight elevator, “I can’t imagine the elevator is all that interesting to… sleep? In?”

He is probably not sleeping.

“I’m looking at the roof,” Answers Hatchworth.

And perhaps he should know better than to question anything that happens here anymore. 

“Well then, why are you doing that then?” He questions anyway, following Hatchworth’s gaze up to the ceiling. 

Yep.

Sure is a flat, solid plane of metal. Just like it’s always been. 

Two wanted to make it fancier, once upon a time. He had sketches of intricate metal engravings he planned to install - he wanted everywhere anyone might see in the manor to be a thing of wonder. He was of the mind that if touring the manor wasn’t an experience to write home about, it wasn’t worth having a manor at all. 

That never did happen. 

Most of Two’s dreams never did happen. Unfortunately most of his notable projects were in the notebook he was holding when he was vaporized.

His dreams cut short as all nightmares became reality. 

“I’ve been watching movies with Norman lately!” Hatchworth informs, as The Spine looks down at him, “In all the movies we watch they climb out the escape hatch during the point where the elevator falls,” 

Right.

Action movies. 

Elevator escapes. 

Yes. 

“Well, Hatchy,” he looks back down to Hatchworth “I’d hardly say action movies are a strong basis of reality, and also this elevator isn’t falling.”

“My elevation sensors are saying we are going down, The Spine.”

“That’s how elevators work, Hatchworth.”

“Oh.” Says Hatchworth. “Well, our elevator doesn't have an escape hatch, The Spine” Hatchworth sits up, slowly. Eyes still set on the ceiling.

“Well I think that’s on account of our elevator being built before those were all that common,.”

“Hm,” Hatchworth finally looks at him, steam pulses from his chimney with a low whistle as he squints, “Hey, The Spine, is there something different with your face?” 

“Well Hatchy, What do you think?” The Spine asks, smiles, somewhat.

Hatchworth keeps squinting at him for a long few moments. 

“Did you get a new mustache?”

Well. 

So much for that. He exhales steam through his neck (still- such a fantastic improvement to anything else). Pinches his nose as he looks up. 

“Now Hatchworth I know that you haven't seen me looking myself in a while—”

“OH! Wait!” he interrupts, “You no longer look like a dollar store human!” Hatchworth says, before he stutters on his next word, “Wait uh-” He’s embarrassed. “No, Well- I meant-”

“No, Hatchy,” The Spine sighs, “Rabbit said that too, I did look awful.”

“I stole that from Rabbit.” Hatchworth admits. “That you looked like a dollar store human.”

What.

“Did you and Rabbit just talk about how ugly I am? Or was?” He questions, looking down. 

“Uh,” Hatchworth sounds distinctly guilty, “No?”

The Spine gawks at him a moment, hands on his hips. 

“Now Hatchy, how do you think you’d feel if me and Zer0 sat around talking about how silly your new mustache looks?”

“It does not look silly!” Hatchworth holds a hand over his hatch, offended.

“Of course it doesn't. But think about it,”

“Hey! Well uh, er,” Hatchworth stumbles, “I like this one more than the other one, your face! That is, it looks more like you did, back uh, back then! And hey – The Spine! Was I just supposed to go, Hey friend The Spine, why are you ugly now? So I asked Rabbit,”

“Well-”

“And then me and Rabbit talked about it, because it did look awful uh- well, no, not awful, that sounds mean -”

“I like it more too, now, Hatchy,” The Spine cuts in,

“Am I mean , The Spine?” Asks Hatchworth. 

The Spine pauses.

“Uh, no. You're fine.”

Hatchworth blinks at him for a few seconds. Chimney whistling. 

“Aaand my face is better now. Less… What was it, dollar store human? Less than, and uh. There there,” he leans down, pats Hatchworth’s shoulder. “You weren’t mean. So– Floor? You want me to press any specific button, or uh… you wanna keep stargazing at a sheet of metal?”

“...I miss WINK, The Spine.”

“...Yeah. Okay . So. A floor. Any of them. Do you want me to read the numbers? We have- Lower Level 7, Lower Level 6, uh, no- no Lower Level 5, never noticed that, hm, wonder where L5 went, uh, Lower Level 4—”

“Remember the space whales?”

“Those were very nice. Lower Level 3—”

“We should do something like that again, The Spine. But with Zer0 this time.”

“Yeah. Uh. What floor? GG’s sorta expecting me, and we’re moving towards my floor, so I don’t have all day, if you want uh, a certain floor,”

“Hmm,” Hatchworth hums, “All the way to the top, Spine,”

“..You sure? 13th floors are kind of cursed,”

"I've gotta go buy a new mustache, The Spine!”

…What?

“Is that… the 13th floor then?”

“Yessiree!”

He doesn’t have time to process that, because the doors open to his floor, (Level 1.6) and he needs to step out. 

He’ll… figure that out later. When was the last time he was in the attic anyway?

It probably has something to do with Hatchy and Rabbit sneaking out regardless. Large fake mustaches and wigs. All that. 

For now, he really should get to GG before she starts breathing fire on the curtains again.

He presses the up button for Hatchworth, and pages Upgrade that the elevator is working, before starting towards the kitchen.

He really hopes GG hasn’t tracked jam everywhere. He likes the new dinosaur curtains and throw pillows in there right now, and if they have jam or fire on them it will be a terrible day. 

And also Six will be upset. 

But mostly he will mourn the dinosaur curtains. They have raptors on them. 

He likes those. 

…

So, the kitchen isn’t far from the freight elevator. It is also along the path to the living room, otherwise and currently known as GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa. 

It's a quick walk. 

Or it would be. It should be a quick walk. 

It would be a quick walk if, as he got closer and closer to the kitchen, he did not slowly notice signs of what might be a catastrophe. A bit of red on the wall there. A purple smudge on the floor there. A lid suspiciously containerless in the corner.

It’s only as he steps into the kitchen proper it all clicks together.

Zer0 is at the counter island.

There are six open jars of Jam. 

And this, of course, must be where GG got the jam.

“So uh, Zer0,” He asks, as he walks in, stepping over a particularly large glob of orange (peach? mango? secret fourth thing?) goo. “Whats with uh, all the jam? In here, and uh, over there,”

“Oh, you know The Spine! I’m making my annual jam tier list,” Zer0 scoops a glob of jam from a jar, flops it onto the counter, and The Spine cringes. 

He does not envy whoever will be getting that out of Zer0's hands. And gears. And off the table. 

But regardless: What. 

He’s never heard of an annual jam tier list. 

“Oh. Uh, I don’t think I know about that one, Zer0, why uh,” He peers around the kitchen, there is jam everywhere. “Why are we doin’ that now?”

“Well Upgrade mentioned something about how you guys used to jam out in the 90s! I wanted to see what that was like, y’know?” 

Ah.

So that’d do it. 

“Oh, uh, Zer0 that’s not quite what that means,” He cuts in, takes a step closer, “I think Upgrade was probably referring too-”

Zer0 looks up, and his expression jumps into a shocked grin, 

“WOAH.” Says Zer0, “OH MY GOSH SPINE. YOUR FACE,”

Zer0 takes a step towards him, Jammy hands outstretched.

“YOUR FACE IS SO COOL,”

That's at least not a bad reaction?

Other than the hands, that's a good reaction. 

(He still recognizes him.)

“Oh, well, thank you, Zer0, I do think it looks very cool,” he takes a step back, “How about you uh, wipe off your hands?”

“It looks like Rabbit's face but more like The Jon's face and kind of like Upgrade and Hatchworth's face!”

“Yes,” He sidesteps to the sink, turns on the water, “But don’t touch me with the jam.”

“But not Beebops face or Qwerty’s face!”

“Yep. Sink is on. I do not want jam on my face.”

Zer0 stops beside him, before he blinks, and does, thank everything, start rinsing off his hands. 

The Spine has only had his face for under 24 hours. It is far too early to be jammed. 

“So The Spine!” Zer0 has rinsed most of the sticky off, probably, “Where did you get it The Spine? Can I have one?”

Zer0 shakes off his hands. The Spine still would rather not be touched by them. Far too sticky.

But at least they are less actively blueberry purple.

“Well, Zer0, Six made it for me based on some old photos of me before my face got changed in 1955,”

“Your face was changed? What???” Zer0 sets his hands on his shoulders. That's acceptable, he supposes. This vest needs to be cleaned anyway. 

“Well, yes,” He tilts his head so Zer0 can see, intentionally directs steam from his cheeks, “It was back in the year of 1955! The Government retrofitted me for the Vietnam War, during which they augmented my face to the one you are familiar with.”

“That's weird, The Spine, Why did they do that?”

“Well, supposedly it was to send me on special missions for them. But that did only happen once or twice—”

“WOAH,” Zer0 cuts in, “The Spine are you a super duper spy???”

Ah.

Okay then.

“Well I suppose on a technicality, but I am entirely retired from that now—”

“The Spine, can I be a spy??” Zer0 interrupts. 

The Spine pauses.

What?

“Well, Zer0, it really wasn’t that interesting or fascinating. It just sort of ended up with me having a not very functional face for half my life,”

Zer0 gasps, covers his mouth with his hands.

Oh no?

“ The Spine, ” he gasps, hands still over his mouth.

“Uh. Yes Zer0?”

“You HATED being a super-duper-uper spy?? But I wanted to be a spy with you!”

…he should have guessed.

“Ah well Zer0, I didn’t particularly hate it,” he didn’t particularly like it but… “I just prefer the music, is all,”

“Oh well, I love music too The Spine! Though I still don’t get what Upgrade meant by jam having anything to do with music,”

“Yeah.” The Spine agrees, maybe- well, no, not maybe. He should probably get Zer0 away from the jam. Before something worse happens. “Well, Anyway Zer0, GG keeps messaging me, she’s waiting in the living room- excuse me, her spa , for me, you wanna… come with?”

He gestures towards the way out, backstepping out from Zer0’s jammy hands, internally cringing a bit at the sticky riiiip sound as they pull from his shoulders. 

“Yeah sure The Spine! Does GG know about my Jam tier list?”

“No ah- maybe it's best you don’t mention it… She got some jam on her scarf, Zer0. You know the really puffy one that she wears everywhere-”

“THE SPA JAM. I FORGOT IT.”

That fully explains it, then. 

“I have to fix her scarf, The Spine! How uh, how do I do that?”

“Well, I was going to give her scarf to Chelsea to fix,”

“I can do that, let's go The Spine!”

Zer0 grabs his hand, and pulls him towards GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa.

…

GG is curled up on her GG Exclusive Spa Bed (a dog bed Peter bought that has her name embroidered in shining pink thread on the front) when they walk in. Staring somewhat miserably at her scarf, which lays crumpled on the floor in front of her. 

Truly the picture of misery. 

Then she sees them, and she’s on her feet in seconds, trotting over, scarf in her mouth, 

“Thg Spne!” Shouts GG, muffled through scarf, “Thke thg scrvf!”

He reaches down, and, tentatively, plucks it from her mouth. 

Eurgh. 

It is jammy. 

“See The Spine!! My scarf is covered in jam— aaaaaand whattt??? ”

GG cranes her head up at him, jaw slack and open. 

“The Spine you look different??? ”

“Yes. Peter A. Walter VI restored my face to its previous appearance.”

“You look pretty,” GG says, “Can we just ask Peter to make us prettier??”

“Uh GG—”

“I wanna be prettier!”

Oh no. 

“I want Peter to make me a pretty pretty bow and I want it to sit right under my horn, and I want to have a pretty skirt that swooshes, and I want to be taller, I’m so short Spine my little legs are so short, and I really really want a pretty bow-”

“GG IM SO SORRY,” Cuts in Zer0, “I LEFT JAM ON THE FLOOR AND IT GOT ON YOUR SCARF.”

GG pauses, then turns, slowly, to look at Zer0.

“You. YOU DID THIS?”

“GG I don't know how to fix it. I'm so sorry I know you love your pretty scarf and in fact I think it's the prettiest scarf in the world!!”

GG’s eyes are glowing blue. She stomps her hoof, furious, And he does not want her breathing fire all over the brand new dinosaur curtains that are right there. Right in fire range. 

“Hey hey hey GG, no need for uh, no need for that.” He reaches down with his free hand, pats her head awkwardly. “Maybe- Maybe our good friend Zer0 here can make you a new bow while Chelsea- I mean me- while I take this to the dry cleaner?”

“The Spine he got JAM in my FAVORITE SCARF!”

“I can make you a bow!” Zer0 cuts in, “I can make you such a pretty bow GG! I have all this really pretty ribbon and- and you’d look super nice in it!”

“Hmph. Two bows. And any GGbucks I gave you.”

“Wait, GG, all my GGbucks? I earned those-”

“AND you’re in GGbuck debt now.”

“...I’m in GGbuck debt?? NO!”

“Yep! Now hop to it! Once you finish my bows I’ll THINK about waiving the GGbuck fees for getting JAM in my SCARF,”

“Anything to get out of GGbuck debt, GG,”

GG nods, and starts towards the door, but she pauses, throws her head over her shoulder to look back at him. 

“Oh yah, The Spine, thanks for fixing my scarf, please and thank you and byee~” 

“Bye The Spine!” Zer0 waves, and then he’s alone in GG’s Perfect Paradise and Spa.

Well. He’ll… leave this very jammy scarf at Chelsea’s desk with a note, then. 

Chelsea can deal with it. She even has a car and a drivers license to bring it to the dry cleaners.

…

It's as he’s walking down to Chelsea’s desk that he turns around the corner to a stairwell and runs directly into Six, Annie, and Marshmallow, who is tailing behind them.

“The Spine!” greets Six, “You are just the robot I wanted to see!” Peter walks towards him, leans close, “Do not tell my mom about the jam in the kitchen. She’ll freak out ,” He whispers quickly, under his breath.

Then Peter turns around, swoops his arms out and up as he gestures to him. 

“So Mom! Didn’t he turn out great! His new face! I think I did a wonderific job,”

Annie’s lips are a bit pursed, as she looks him up and down. 

The Spine knows Annie well. He’s spent the last 32 years living in a house with her. He knows she never quite ‘got’ the robot thing. She loves Five, though, and after all the tragedy in their family, their wedding was the party of the decade.

“Oh!” She says, “Yes. Um. Very good. Is it to look more like Rabbit? Should I- is he/him still..?”

The Spine holds up a hand and waves. GG’s (stained) (jammy) (sticky) scarf sways in the air. 

Annie squints at it. 

“Nope! Ah- no, The Spine is still a man, unless—” Peter rounds on him, “Do you want to be anything else? Did I ever ask you that? I should have asked you that after the mix-up with Rabbit.”

“You did ask me that. And I am perfectly content with being a man.” 

“Sweet.” Peter throws a thumbs up, turns back to Annie, “So yeah Mom, he still uses he/him, just a new face.”

Annie nods, but her eyes remain locked on the scarf. 

Hm. 

The scarf is light blue. The dark purple blotches of jam are quite obvious. This may pose an issue in hiding the jam.

“Soooo, anyway! About his face,” chirps Peter, going right back to gesturing at his head. “I’m currently working on a project to restore The Spine’s face to pre-1955 operational abilities and appearance! Currently we are operating as normal with a prototype design, to work out any kinks, mechanical flaws, and/or possible implementation issues, but you like it The Spine, don’t you?”

“Yes, Pete.” The Spine agrees. “It is very nice.”

Six is like Three in a lot of ways. None of the bad ones, none of the abrasiveness, or the shell-shocked haunting, or the far-away and erratic manner he’d get after Two passed, but the way he talks about working on them...

There’s a certain vibrancy to him, when he talks about fixing them all, working on them all. The animated gestures, the pacing, the fidgeting he’s just like him. Or how he could have been, had things been different. 

How Three could have been if he hadn’t been to War. 

“See, and uh- moving forward in the project, Mom, I’ll be spending time streamlining the design as well as comparing it to old archival photos and records for accuracy in both form and and overall funct—”

“Hey, The Spine?” Annie interrupts, “If I might ask, what got on GG’s scarf?” 

The scarf is posing as issue in hiding the jam. 

Beside him, he can practically see Peter’s heart skip a beat as he freezes. He can feel, through Peter’s mask, his stare as Peter turns to face him. 

“...Jam?” The Spine offers, not quite yet wanting to lie. 

It's not like he can’t lie. People assume that he can't. He can. He just does not like to. Rabbit lies recreationally. Someone simply has to balance her out. That someone is him.

“ Spine. ” He hears Peter hiss, low. “ Spine she will kill me, ”

“Who.. Gave GG Jam?” Annie asks, lips growing thinner as she stares at the scarf.

The Spine shifts. 

Well.

The question is now “is he going to be a snitch”. 

Peter, beside him, is all but vibrating in place. 

…Peter did just spend nearly a day working on him to ensure his comfort going forward. Why not?

He can’t tell her it was Zer0. That's too close to admitting about the mess in the kitchen. He is glad his vest is black. That hides the jam on his shoulders. 

“Well, who’s to say, really, but GG was quite miffed about the thing,” 

Lola or Veronica will handle the mess soon regardless. 

“But well, GG wanted me to bring it to the dry cleaner.” he continues, “Which is, ah, why I have it, now?”

Beside him, Peter’s head rotates 90° towards him. 

“No? What? No. Nope. You cannot go to the dry cleaners, The Spine,” he twists towards him, following his head as he reaches for the scarf, “How would you even get to—” Peter starts to say as he snaps the scarf from The Spine’s hand, but cuts himself off. 

“Oh eugch. ” coughs Peter, “This is- huh! This is horrible. Wow. Uh. This is so much jam?”

The Spine can hear the scrunch in his nose, even if he can’t see it beneath his mask. 

“Wait, baby your bandages, ” Annie gasps, and then she’s back at Peter’s side in a second, shoving the (jammy) (sticky) (stained) scarf back at The Spine. 

He takes it. 

“I’m going to need to redo them now,” Annie says, and what?

“Mom I’m fine, ” Peter squirms back a step.

“You have burnt your hand to blisters, you are not walking around with jam on your bandages,” 

Peter what?

“Excuse me,” The Spine cuts in, “Peter, what happened to your hand?”

“Nothing important, and nothing you need to know,” says Peter, and while The Spine does get the sense that it’s a lie, Peter is already back-stepping towards Marshmallow.

Marshmallow, being Marshmallow, immediately starts licking the jam off Peter’s very much bandaged apparently hand,

“See, Mom, no jam now!” Peter announces, though, perhaps for once, he and Annie are together in incredulity, “Lets take Marshmallow on his walk, you know, there’s also supposed to be a new cafe just down the road-”

“8th dimensional cat saliva is worse than jam, Peter!” Annie follows Peter over to Marshmallow, pulls his hand out from Marshmallow's mouth before the spine can even insinuate hey six don't do that maybe.

Peter’s hand is, in fact, now dripping cat saliva. 

“It's scientifically proven to have antibacterial properties,” Peter rattles off. 

“No.” Annie’s probably the least amused he’s ever seen her. And he’s seen her after Rabbit set their last set of curtains on fire. 

“It is! I can prove it!” Peter waves his other hand around, as if this proves his point. 

“No. I am not interested in your un-peer reviewed study tested solely on the workers, Pete. You did that when you were 16. Come on. We’re going to the first aid kit.”

“Mom.” 

“Peter.” 

She sounds just like Iris talking Two out of opening another portal. 

Ah, memories.

“Can’t I at least finish telling you about The Spine’s new face?” Peter starts, but Annie is already starting down the hall, he takes a stumbling half-step after her. “Mom!”

Marshmallow yawns, standing up and turning to follow Annie. “Marshmallow! No! Not you too!” Peter pouts, then, as Annie keeps walking, sighs. Shoulders falling. 

He does genuinely look a bit disappointed. The Spine pats him on the shoulder. 

“We can always schedule in you telling her more about my face with me there later?” He offers.

“No- no. It’s- Vivian listens to me ramble all day long anyway, there’s no point in doubling up, really,” Peter starts walking backwards, facing him still, after Annie, “Anyyyway, I should uh, go with her, or she’ll have my head- no pun intended, but uh, you’re not going to walk to the dry cleaners? I do not trust my wiring enough to send you on a solo adventure, and I trust my wiring plenty,” 

“I fully intended to put this scarf on Chelsea’s desk, Peter.”

“Coolio! Goody great. A+ plan. Uh, thanks for not mentioning you know what, and also bye,” He turns, then, and speedwalks after his mom. 

The Spine watches him, a moment, then looks back down at GG’s scarf.

He really wishes he were not holding it, right now.

It is very covered in jam.

Chapter Text

The Spine leaves GG’s scarf at Chelsea’s desk. He writes her a note to bring it to be cleaned. She and Camille are on a short vacation, right now, so, while it may be a while, it will not be his problem for a while either.

Then he heads up to the Hall Of Wires to acquire a vest that isn’t quite so covered in jam.

Jammy vest. It is horrific. He does not like jam in general. He likes it significantly less on his vest.

He likes the Hall Of Wires, though. He likes how far it is from everything else. He likes the door. Having a door is underrated. Even if Rabbit does make constant knock-knock jokes.

He’s kind of tired of knock knock jokes. 

He and QWERTY co-exist well enough in there though.

Reaching for the door, The Spine pauses. 

It's bright inside the hall of wires. He can see the light under the frame.

Which is odd. He doesn’t usually have windows in there, so the lights must be on. The lights are never on in there unless—

Unless someone unexpected is in there. 

Slowly, he pushes open the the door, stepping inside. Cautious of perhaps a ‘surprise you got a new face’ party, or.. Something.

A surprise! New face! party is far too much energy right now.

Instead, he is greeted by Peter A. Walter V. 

Peter A. Walter V. Mark Ray Walter's son. 

...He misses Mark often. 

Immediately, The Spine is nervous. For no good reason. But nervous.

Five saw him before all this.

Before 1955.

Before the alterations to his appearance.

Not often. Not quite up close at an age he'd recall well beyond perhaps a vague impression. He was only three when Mark passed. He was still only nine when he finally came home.

There were only a handful of times he was in the manor and old enough to remember he saw him.

But Five did see him before.

Five isn’t exactly seeing him right now, though.

He sits on the floor, back turned to the door, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, portable computer balanced somewhat precariously on his knees, code open on the tri-pod monitor as QWERTY pouts a  :/  in front of him as he types.

Bugfixing. 

QWERTY tilts sideways as he enters, stretches towards the door in order take his ID, log his entry, but Five reaches up, grabs QWERTY's main monitor stem, and pulls him back towards the wall, anchoring him still. “I haven’t fixed your movement yet, young man.”

 ERROR-ERROR LEL  says QWERTY ROBUT WHAT IS UR ID CODE THNX. AND BE OVER HERE. 2 ENTER IT 

“Walterbot Zero-Two, The Spine, Silver version two-point-five, running 2016 QWERTY,” spells out Five, without even turning around, “Is who just entered, QWERTY, Unless it isn't.”

He looks up at the camera QWERTY sees from- its red dot eye is focused on him. He holds up a hand in a wave. 

“Yes, Peter. It's me.” He steps closer to where his shirts are pressed and folded. “I’ll be in and out so-”

 ERROR THE SPINE IS 2 COOL ERROR. 2 MUCH EPIC. EPIC VARIABLE EXCEEDS INTEGER LIMIT 

QWERTY notices his face, then. 

“QWERTY, what— What does that even mean? Too much epic? Print an actual error code if you’re going to say error— no, no. Not the sorry I'm too funny for you dad, one, stop printing that, no, stop, hello world means nothing to me right now, stop, are you- I’m trying to fix your movement and wheels, stop printing fake errors, son,”

QWERTY’s monitor face is a large grin, as all the camera’s in the room focus on him, rather than Five. 

“Regardless. The Spine, Why are you here?”

I live here. He thinks, shrugs. 

“Zer0 has painted the kitchen with jam. And also my vest. I intend to swap to a less jammed vest.”

Five stiffens. 

“Good lord help us all.” he mutters, under his breath, turns to look at him. He starts to stand, then pauses. 

Blinks. 

Squints. 

Pulls his glasses out of his shirt pocket, puts them on his nose. Squints again. Takes them off, cleans them on his shirt, and puts them back on.

“Huh.” Says Five. “Well. Darn. Shoot. Was I supposed to know about this? Because if I was, the dementia jokes have gone too far.” 

 EPIC VARIABLE HAS BEEN CONVERTED 2 A FLOAT     Says QWERTY.   IT IS OVER 9000 

“Peter A. Walter VI has restored my face to better reflect my blueprints and pre-1955 modeling.” He says, standing still. Trying to read Five’s expression.

Human expressions are so difficult. Especially when they’re this complex. Brow creased, something not a smile but not a grimace. It makes sense in sections but not as a whole. 

“Well. I can see that.” Says Five, walking closer. “Was I supposed to— no point in asking that. My son has his own journeys. Did you want me to do that before now?”

The Spine jolts. His turbine kicks a bit higher. He is still covered in jam. He does not know. He doesn’t know anything. Much less what he has ever wanted at any given point regarding his face.

He never asked. He never would have asked. Asking even now was difficult. Asking without Rabbit would have been impossible. Rabbit was preoccupied with her own problems before.

He did not even know he wanted it until recently. 

It was difficult. 

“I did not ask, Peter” He says. 

Five stares at him for a long few moments. Tense in the shoulders. He can recognize that. Annoyance? Stress? Both? 

“I’ll check Pete's work when I’m done with QWERTY. Make sure nothing's broken—”

“No thank you, Peter.” He cannot be worked on again right now. He needs a break. He needs to have everyone away from his wiring and face for at least a bit. “I am quite alright for now.”

“The Spine, you know how that boy is. Half the time he thinks with his heart, not his head. How long did this even take Pete to set up. A month? If it was longer than that I would have heard about it. At least let me check the wiring. And what if the mouth doesn’t sync with your recorded song BCI files? He wouldn’t have thought of that—”

 DAD-O   Says QWERTY.  BEEBOP IS— 

 ALERT,   QWERTY’s screen, and every other one in the Hall Of Wires (There are a lot of screens in the hall of wires) go blue, and Beebop’s face appears,  ALERT. WALTER. ROBOT. ZERO. TWO. IS. TWO. POINT. SEVEN. PERCENT. TOO. WARM. DIAGNOSTICS. INDICATE. RECENT. BOILER. MAINTENANCE. MAY. REQUIRE. INSPECTION. 

“Beebop,” Starts Five, turning around, “Lower the volume by 80%, I have ears, not microphones. And there isn't a crowd.”

 AND. I. LIKE. THE. FACE. THE. SPINE. 

“Well thanks.” He says. And the screens all go dark. 

 —STEALING MY SCREEN. SADZ. SADZ. I HAZ NO CHEEZBURGR. 

Five looks between QWERTY and him for a moment, then sighs. “Right. Spare my bluntness, The Spine, but ah, 2% is high. Report diagnostics on your internals?”

“I am running within all operational standards as outlined by you in 1995. My core’s heat is running slightly warmer than standard operation. It has nothing to do with recent failures.”

“....Should I know about those?”

The Spine frowns. He just wants a non-jammy vest. Steam pours from his neck.

But Five should know about his mechanical issues yesterday. It is the fact of the matter. Five is the senior robotics operations manager, even if he is partially retired. 

“My boiler’s safety valve catastrophically failed during restoration. My core overheated causing overpressurization of my boiler.”

 #BOOM   Says QWERTY.

Five’s eyes widen. 

“...Is your core compromised?” His expression is grim. Lips pressed flat. He can recognize this one.

The Spine is uncomfortably reminded of Two crouched in front of Hatchworth, so long ago. The way his mouth twisted downward. The way he glanced sideways at Three, quiet scrutinization. None of them had known what a compromised core meant then. They learned soon enough. 

His core is fine.

“I overheated due to stress.” It's mortifying to admit. “Not due to any mechanical issue.” 

“Stress?”

Does he need to spell it out?

“I do not like saws near my neck, Peter.”

Five’s frown warps, and then he whistles, low, puts a hand on his hip. 

“You don’t like having your head worked on?”

“...I do not. No.” Admitting it is awful. Acknowledging problems is awful. Having problems is horrific.

Five scratches at the stubble on his chin.

“.....I guess if they took my face I wouldn’t like it much either. My boy doesn’t.”

“You would not.” The Spine confirms.

It's tense. Things are always so tense. 

“Do you think Pete did well?” Asks Five, and The Spine can see worry creased into his eyes, pressed into his lips.

Five all but rebuilt them after the fiasco in Veitnam. 

He worries.

“...My current face that I have equipped is a prototype Peter. A. Walter VI created. It will be replaced when he finishes a more finalized version. We are collecting data and information at the moment to better support future operational goals." 

 #UNBOOM   Says QWERTY, who is now slowly rising up behind Five. 

Five taps his thigh, chews on that thought for a few moments. “I’ll talk to Pete about it. I don’t want you overheating next time. And I want to see the plans myself going forward.”

“I do not think that I will overheat again, Peter. My ventilation is within my operational standards now.”

“Well, we can’t be too careful. How about- I don’t need to check his wiring if it’ll be replaced soon anyway, but- in a few days maybe, we all- You, me, my kid, we all sit down and figure out what data points to gather during the prototype period to better optimize end results for success here?”

That's...acceptable. 

But..

“I would like Rabbit to sit in with me if I am going to discuss that.”

“Sure. Rabbit too.” Five agrees, he fidgets with the keys hanging from his belt. 

That's… he can do that. Specific data points to watch, and what to look for while in test phases would be valuable for improvement. It is probably a good idea. 

But he sort of wants to never think about any of this again, at least for a while. 

Behind Five, QWERTY has begun to creep up the wall. Vertically. raising himself up.

“And ah- before I forget,” Five snaps his fingers, remembering, looks back over, “What was that about Zer0 and jam?”

“He was filling out his annual jam tier list. Jam is everywhere.”

Human Emotions are often hard to compute.

Five’s grimace, and his eye twitch is recognizable as something like grief and resignation, though.

“Well that’s… Fantastic.” It clearly isn't. “I have things to attend to despite this. If you see Lola or Veronica tell them to handle the mess before-” Five turns back around to QWERTY, cutting off mid word with a scoff.

QWERTY has now, successfully, escaped to the ceiling. 

“Qwerty,” Five says, exhausted, “Why?”

 IM BATMAN LOL 

“That doesn’t even make sense.”

 HELLO WORLD 

“You are 33 years old. You do not need to keep printing Hello World.”

 HAHA NOPEZ I AM BABIE 

“Get back down here. I need to finish making sure you know directions again. Do you know how high up you are right now?”

 COME UP HERE DAD-O 

“How.”

The Spine takes this as a cue to swap out his vest, and perhaps get out of Five’s hair. 

…

Wanda. Wanda Hottie. Wanda Becile. Wanda Walter.  

As it stands, she and Norman are the only who haven't seen him now.

Is it odd that she’s the one he’s most nervous to confront? She was only 24 when his face was altered. She saw him, him,  in unaltered memory, unfaded by youth, with human eyes. She saw him as himself. 

She is 90 now.

And somehow she is much more frightening to see than any of his siblings. 

After brainstorming a while on how to casually approach her, The Spine decides to bring tea up to Wanda. That seems like a typical thing he might normally do.

Tea is a simple thing for a robot to make. For him to make. Out of the considerable number of types of human foods, he has found that tea has the fewest number of parts he could mess up and accidentally make inedible. It is simple. You boil water in a designated kettle. You transfer the water to the smaller heat-safe container such as a teacup, or mug. Then you place the labeled tea bag in the water. 

Wanda can remove the tea bag herself when she desires to. She can add however many sugar cubes she likes. 

It is difficult for him to be the problem if it goes terribly wrong. 

But still. He finds himself, tea tray in his arms, buffering at the door to Wanda’s room. She has a curtain across the door, yellow, draping. Behind it he can see light from her window. 

He’s nervous. 

He wishes he were just less nervous. 

When she first saw his new, altered face so long ago now, he still remembers the look she had on her own. She was somewhere between grief and exhaustion. 

He remembers the way her laugh turned hysterical, as Upgrade demanded her get away from him.

He remembers the stricken expression she wore when she realized The Jon didn’t recognize him.

He remembers her telling him only a month or so later, as she helped load him into the trailer for the World’s Fair, to show off his new face and new upgrades to the world. That she was sure he was still him, under all of it. 

He remembers the way she took his hand, looked at him, a fierceness there. Told him that when he plays on stage, it’ll be his personality, not the new face that wins the crowd. 

He remembers that being the only comfort he had back then. It always stuck with him. Even at the worst of times. 

No matter how he looks, his personality would win more than anything else.

It stuck with him.

Perhaps he should use that advice now. Rely on his personality over his face, no matter how different it may be now, to go in there and give her the tea. 

The tea which, as he stands here trying to get himself together, is only getting colder with each passing minute. 

He pushes into her room.

“Wanda?” He greets, “I brought up tea for you.”

It's not a terribly out of character thing for him to do. He does bring her tea, when he wants company, or just to be kind. Hatchworth would often do the same, once upon a time.

Then there was no Hatchworth for quite a while. But there was a long time where it was the only way he could see Wanda smile.

She lost her husband, her father, and her brother in two years. Then she had to pull the company together on her lonesome while raising Five, who, after that orphanage, was not particularly easy to raise. 

She was alone all but for recently-moved-in Norman then. 

Wanda is sprawled onto her chair, when he enters. It's sunny yellow in color, like most of her and Norman’s room. 

She’s clipped a book lamp two inches above her head, and her nose is practically pressed against the page of a book about the history of alchemy and math through the years. 

She looks up, already half saying something before she startles, nearly drops her book as her jaw goes so slack.

“The Spine?”

“I brought tea.” He holds up the tray. 

Huh.

Why was he ever nervous?

“I’m too young to die,” She sputters, awed, “Or hallucinate, whichever this is, is that you?”

“Well unless your great nephew has done something truly surprising, or has finally figured out your fathers supposed time machine, no.” He sets down the tea tray on her reading table, “How is your book?”

“Did Pete do your face?”

“Peter A. Walter VI, yes. I do think I look rather normal for once.” He drops the tea bag in to steep, that is step two, “It has been a long time since I did.”

“He did fantastic.” She stares. 

“The Sixth is that, yes.”

“Come here. My eyes aren’t perfect anymore,” 

“Well your eyes were never perfect, Wanda, you just dislike how you look in glasses and are finally glad for an excuse,”

She snorts, and he walks over, crouching with a hiss of steam, 

“Now, Wanda, I will say, this is not a finished model, we are testing out what Peter reconstructed from photos-”

“You know, I wish you’d just asked me, The Spine. I have my fathers sketches of how your head goes together, I know it. I saw them back when that boy ruined his head. When I was looking for anything Dad had written about that sort of thing, explosions and all, I saw the way the front plates of your face were supposed to click together.”

….That would have been good to know. 

“But you look perfect. Very you, The Spine” 

Why was he ever worried?

“It’s not the exact same,” She turns his face to the side, hand tilting his chin, “Bit different in width and shape here in the vents in your cheek,” She pats the side of his head, “But it's shaped better now, I think, less like you were starving. More angular, artistic even.”

“I— Look like myself, though?” He asks, and she nods, takes his shoulder.

Her hand is as steady as it's always been. 

“The Spine, you’ve never looked more you than right now. Now hand me that tea and get Norman to come up here for me. He needs to see this.”

…

The Spine used to have complex thoughts about Norman Becile. 

Those thoughts got a lot less complex when he saw Wanda smile as Norman danced her around the living room to the music on the radio. 

He made her laugh, made her smile, even after everything that happened in 1950. 

Her being happy again was more than he ever could have asked for, really. 

The Spine decided then- it would have been around 1954, as he watched Wanda fall into his chest, laughing like he hadn’t heard in years, that perhaps Norman was alright. 

…

Norman comes upstairs. Walks into the room, and, like she always does, Wanda lights up as she sees him. 

“Normie!” She stands, she’s so bright, around him, “Look what the cat dragged in,” She gestures at him, “Do you remember before 1955? I think I had you over once or twice before then…”

“Oh well hm,” Norman peers at him, tilting his head to focus his vision, “You look like a proper WalterBot now. Is that good?”

He doesn’t expect it to hit him as hard as it does.

It's a simple sentiment really. 

He doesn’t know what to say. 

“Of course it is,” Cuts in Wanda, she wraps her arm around Norman’s back, leans against his side.

“Well, it's very Walter.” Norman observes, “The ventilation, and shape of the face. Sharp angles. Which is what you were going for for, I uh, figure?”

He looks Walter. 

He didn’t look Walter, did he? Was that the problem? That unnamed problem he never quite could describe. Certainly he never looked himself. Never looked like his siblings. Never looked like he was designed.

But all of that was opinion. 

He looked generally futuristic. He looked like what was put on television to point to and say that, that is the future. He looked like a robot. 

He did not look Walter. 

He looks Walter again. 

He is his fathers creation, even if most of his original parts are gone now. 

He is a WalterBot. 

He always has been. Looking it again, it is more a relief than he thought it would be. Thought it could be. 

He didn't even know what he was looking for.

WALTER ROBOT 002 THESPINE-1896

SILVER.V2.5.2016

He’ll never be anything else again.

He’ll never be anything else again.

He is titanium.

He is The Spine.

He is still running. 

He will keep performing.

He will have his own face all the while.

“Thank you, Norman,” He says, “I do think I look quite nice like this. And that was exactly what The Sixth was aiming for.”

Making him look like him. 

Making him look Walter.

…

Evening comes. He and Rabbit are sitting outside, on the bench in the back of the yard by the pond. 

Dappled sunlight peeks through the leaves as he stares at his warping reflection in the water. 

“Y’know, Spine,” She tosses a handful of frozen peas into the water, and a duck swims across his reflected face, gobbling them up, “I think Pete did a good job on your face.” She waves her hands at the ducks. “I’m glad it worked, and you’re happy with it.”

He rests his chin on his hands. 

“Thank you for making me tell him, Rabbit.”

“...You’re thanking me?” She elbows him in the side. “Cuz if you want to thank me, you should start l-l-l-l-listening to all my advice all the time.”

“...Now I think that’s a little unfair, Rabbit.”

“Nope!” She laughs “Not unfair at all!”

He finds himself joining in. 

The sun is shining. 

“Y’know, Spine,” She tosses another handful of peas, “What Three did really sucked, even if it helped keep the company goin’.”

He’s quiet, a long few moments. Gazes at the pond. 

Rabbit must take that as a cue to keep going.

“And l-l-l-like, sure, Spine, the War fucked him up, and Two dying like— d-d-d-destroyed him,” She continues, “He wasn’t as— weird before the war, I mean, not Two, that was different, he still— I mean I’m not g-g-g-gonna make excuses for how he treated me, Spine. He did pretty much tell me ‘no, you’re not a woman cuz’ your voice isn’t right and you’re a robot so it doesn’t matter’, but- it was like 1925, s-s-s-so…”

Three wasn’t the same, when they all came home from World War One.

“A-a-a-and like, Iris would’ve been odd about it- me lookin’ like Miss Morreo, wayyy back then.” She looks over at him, catches his gaze, before she looks back to the ducks. 

“So it's like—” She tosses another handful of peas. The ducks splash, excited, as they eat. “I sorta just wish I could’ve just been me, y’know? Not modeled after Delilah, not- not told no cuz Pappy broke my voicebox, when he uh- y-y-y-y-you know, I just wish- you know, Spine.”

“I know.” 

He hears birds chirping in the trees. A frog croak somewhere in the reeds. The ducks have a nest in the pond. Soon there will be ducklings.

He exhales steam. 

Despite everything, they’re still here. Still running. 

“I wish I just coulda been me. For more of it. And— Spine he, Three, I mean, he didn’t need to agree to let them ch-ch-ch-change your face, y'know? Or— like, he shoulda talked to you about it, if Two had been there he woulda asked you, like- he didn't need to do all that, Spine. You didn’t deserve that, and I should’ve been able to pick who I was, and he shouldn’t’ve made all those choices for us, and… I dunno, what he did to you, and your face, and all that, it s-s-s-sucked, Spine, is all.”

“...When Two died,” The Spine turns his gaze up. The clouds above them paint the sky, they’re are white, full. The sky is as blue as their cores. “He wasn’t the same after. I don’t blame him. Really, Rabbit. If suddenly you were gone, Rabbit, broken or otherwise gone, I’d probably do something just as horrible.”

Rabbit pauses, next to him, thinking. 

He thinks she might disagree about Three.

Instead, she elbows him in the side again,

“Aww, Spine,” She swings her arm around his back, “You do care!” There’s a look to her, still, that she knows she’s glossing over all the hurt but..

But it's bright out here.

And she’s smiling at him still. 

“I’m glad you’re doing well too, these days, Rabbit. You… For a while you really weren’t.”

She wasn’t. 

She was miserable for a lot of it. He knows why now. But he wasn’t much better himself really. 

Perhaps so many years of war does that. 

Rabbit pulls back, flexes her wrist joints, and steals his hands. “Hey, Spine, look at me. Right at me.”

He meets her gaze.

Her eyes pulse bright. One green, one blue.   

“Spine, I’m doin’ better than well, these days, I’m doing perfect.” She smiles. It's not even forced. “I’m just glad you can maybe start doin’ perfect too.”

It's bright out here. 

And who knows?

Maybe he can. 

Maybe he will. 

“I love you, Rabbit.” He says, and her expression softens. She squeezes his hands, tight, before letting go. 

Then she presses her bag of frozen peas into his hands. 

“Feed the ducks, Spine, It's a nice day.”

“...It really is, Rabbit.”

It really is. 

“I love ya too, Spine.” she says, as he casts out a handful of peas. “I really do.”

…

2016. Two Thousand and Sixteen.

What a year. What a year it has been.

120 years and counting, since 1896. It was a long time, really. But they have at least that amount of time to go. 

Things are looking up.

There is, as he looks forward, a bright sky on the horizon.

He’s happier than before. He’s more himself than he’s been in a long, long time. You don’t quite know what a wonder just being able to catch a glimpse of your reflection and recognizing it as you is for morale until you regain that. 

He’d said, once upon a time, that Rabbit was monumentally herself after she was finished. And well? For once, he’s himself now. 

Recognizably. 

Internally.

Monumentally. 

It's nice, having bright skies on the horizon. 

It's nice, having things turn out just fine for once.

He’s more than happy.

Things are finally looking up

Things are, after all of this, finally looking up.